


Gods and Monsters |Twilight Rewritten|

by Sweetest_Creature



Series: The Twilight Saga: Rewritten [1]
Category: Twilight Series - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, twilight is gay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2019-10-26
Packaged: 2020-08-20 09:57:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 25
Words: 106,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20225962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sweetest_Creature/pseuds/Sweetest_Creature
Summary: I'd never given much thought to how I would die.  Though I guessed dying in the place of someone I loved, was a good way to go.  But, even if I had spared any thoughts about my death, I would have never imagined it like this.Across the long, dark room stood the hunter.  I looked into his soulless dark eyes, and he looked back at me, with hunger.Had I never stepped foot in Forks, I knew I wouldn't be looking in the eyes of my killer in that moment.  But still, I didn't dare regret my decision.  Even as terrified as I was.  The way I looked at it, when life hands you the love of your life, it's not reasonable to grieve when she's taken away.The hunter smiled in a friendly way as he stalked forward to kill me.





	1. First Sight

**Author's Note:**

> So, I have decided to rewrite twilight into what it should’ve been. Gay as fuck. I have changed only one characters name. That’s Renee. And a many more characters are no longer white. Because white people are not the only people to exist in this country, Stephenie. Some details might be different. A lot of it might suck, but I personally am happy with what it has been so far. 
> 
> Enjoy.

I sat in the back seat of my mother's car, my curly chocolate hair danced in the warm breeze that came in through the open window that I looked out of at my beloved city passing by, my heart aching a little at the thought of leaving it behind. But I didn't have time to regret my decision to leave home. Yes, I would miss Phoenix. I would miss the heat, I would miss the desert, and I would miss my loving, erratic, harebrained mother. And her new husband, Phil. But, they wanted to venture and go on the road. So, I decided to spend time with my father.

This was a good thing in my mind. I never got to see him.

The car stopped at the terminal, and my little family stepped out of the car. Mom was holding back tears over my departure, so I moved forward to wrap her in a hug, as Phil let us be and moved to get my luggage from the trunk.

"Ma, I'm not going away to die, I'll see you in a few months," I reassured my crying mother. 

"I know, baby, ignore me. I'm just really going to miss you," Mom let out a dramatic sob, letting go of me, planting a kiss on my cheek. "Now, go before I change my mind." 

I kissed her one last time before hugging Phil goodbye, and taking my bags.

"Bye, Bella." He smiled and waving at me, I felt as though he had grown to think of me as his own.

I had only ever flown by myself one time, when I had gone to my grandmother's funeral in Puerto Rico. I was only fourteen and still remembered how nerve wracking it had been. Things hadn't changed, I realized as I stepped inside the busy airport, I was still terrified of flying alone. 

Airports are never anyone's favorite place, it was cold and there were way too many people around rushing everywhere, and they were unpredictable. But I tried my best to rush through the slow security line. If that were even possible. I then celebrated making it past with an overpriced, but amazing, cup of coffee that I drank in a lonely corner by my gate.

My flight was on time, and soon I found myself looking down on the city I loved from the plane that would take me to Seattle, Washington. This wouldn't be my final stop, however, after a three-hour flight, I boarded a charter plane that took me to Port Angeles. It was a short and bumpy ride, and I came out of it promising myself that I wouldn't be doing that again. Next time my father would just have to pick my up in Seattle. 

But, still, Port Angeles wasn't my final destination. Forks was, a little town constantly covered in clouds and rain. That is where I had exiled myself to. My own personal hell.

I walked toward the airports exit with my two small suitcases in hand, warm weather clothes were not an option, me and my mother had to replace everything I owned with winter essentials and I was left with barely anything. I would have to eventually go shopping for more, something I did not look forward to.

My father, Charlie, was waiting outside and the thought of seeing him filled my chest with anxiety. I only ever saw him two weeks out of the year when he was forced to come down to Phoenix for my birthday, now I was moving in with him indefinitely.

Nonetheless, he is my father, so I pushed every negative thought away and took a deep breath as I reached the exit and braced myself for the cold that would embrace me unwelcomely after I opened the doors. The coat I had gotten barely did anything to protect me once I was outside. The icy chill still found ways to sneak in and settle in my bones.

Dad was waiting right by the front doors. He stood leaned against his police cruiser, to the good people of Forks he was known as Chief Swan. As soon as he saw me, he rushed over, wrapping his arms around me, I was a bit taken back. He was like me; quite horrible at showing affection. But I hugged him anyway, after all, I did miss him. 

"Did you get shorter, Bells," he chuckled as he pulled away, placing a hand on top of my head as if to measure my growth. Or lack of thereof.

I huffed, "No, I actually grew." 

He laughed, "I couldn't tell,"

I shook my head, rolling my eyes as he grabbed my suitcases to put in the trunk. While I wasted no time in running to get into the warm car, in my rush I tripped over own feet, I looked around making sure no one was a witness to my clumsiness, before deciding that it never happened.

Inside, I shivered, putting my hands to the heater. Five seconds in the cold and I was ready to give up.

Why did I do this to myself, again? I asked myself, curious about the answer.

Dad joined me a few seconds later, and I cringed away from the cold that he brought in with him.

He grunted as he sat down, aching bones and all, before he began to pull away onto the street, "You picked a good day to come, the weathers starting to warm up a bit," 

My head snapped toward him, a look of disbelief splattered on my face, "Warm? It's freezing, I'm dying!"

He laughed at me, then suddenly stopped, "How's Amelia?"

His whole demeaner changed when he asked about my mom. She had broken his heart and taken me away on top of it. 

Surely, I thought, he was still not over it. 

I decided to keep my answer short, "She's good,"

"And her husband? Phillis?"

Why was he making this more painful than it has to be? "Phil's good too,"

The next hour was tiring for Me, Dad stopped asking about Mom and was mostly quiet, something my tired brain appreciated. I fell asleep half way through the drive and woke in time to be greeted by Forks welcome sign. 

Hmm, population 3,020 people, I thought it'd be less. 

It didn't take long after we crossed Forks boarder for Dad to reach his house, or our house, now. He pulled up into the drive way and I began to brace myself for the cold again, as he killed the engine. Immediately as I stepped out of the car after him, I began shivering in my coat. 

Dad took my suitcases out of the trunk, I took the smaller one as he led the way to the front door. 

I looked around our street while he unlocked the door. It was quiet, just a few crickets could be heard chirping away into the night. Every house on our street was lit, but no one was outside braving the cold. Beside me, with a click, Dad unlocked the door and pushed it open. 

I almost shoved past him to get out of the cold and wet night. 

He laughed at me, locking the door back up and moving up the stairs. It had been years since I had stepped foot in this house, but it still smelled the same, like woods and rain and strong Cuban coffee.

On the way up the stairs, my eyes lingered on the few family pictures that were hanging on the dark green wall, I tried hard not to look at them. But, my eyes stopped at our first picture as a family. Mom was so young, she was twenty when she had me and her smile was wide and bright. Beside her, Dad held me, he was looking at Mom with a look that held so much love, it made me want to cry, and baby me was smiling, my little hand wrapped around Mom's finger. We looked like a happy, little, beautiful family, but this is the house Mom had fled with me from just two years after that photo was taken. Mom was like me in the sense that she hated the cold and the rain. It added to her depression and she couldn't handle being here anymore, prompting her to leave and break Charlie's heart. I looked away and hurried up.

"I cleared some shelves off in the bathroom for you," Dad looked back at me, turning to the room on the left of the stairs.

I had forgotten I would have to share a bathroom now, "oh, right."

He opened the door and walked in, setting my bag down and putting his hands on his hips.

"The sales lady picked out the bed stuff, you're fine with white?" he asked, eyebrow raised.

"yes, thanks dad," I smiled.

He nodded and moved towards the door, "Alright, I'll let you settle."

I smiled at him as he walked out locking the door behind him. One of the best things about Dad was the fact that he didn't hover around. A trait my mother lacked but would benefit from. 

Once I was on my own, I sighed, sitting on my new twin bed, taking in my new room. It was small, with a bay window that outlooked the front of the house. The walls were painted yellow, a desperate attempt from my mother to bring sunlight into the house. The mosquito net my mother had hung above my crib was tide above the bed, and the old rocking chair where she'd rock me to sleep was still in it's place by the window. 

I stood, moving to put my things away in the small closet, the drizzle outside turned into a pour and I knew it would be a long night.

Forks was too loud, the rain pattering away mixed with the howling wind did not let me sleep. I tossed and turned, annoyed and frustrated. Eventually, exhaustion ignored my ears and pulled me into sleep. In the morning, I was woken up by a car door slamming shut and voices talking outside. 

I groaned in annoyance, I just wanted to sleep. I began debating whether to stay in bed or not, but eventually I got up and walked over to my window to see who had woken me up. It was a woman, she was in a wheelchair talking to Charlie. Beside her was a boy around my age. 

Visitors, great. I groaned. 

I sighed before moving to the bathroom to brush my teeth, after I went back to my room and shoved my feet into my boots. I had slept in sweats and a hoodie, in an attempt to keep warm, despite the heat being on all night the cold still found a way to creep in.

I walked downstairs tired, grabbing my coat from its place by the door before stepping outside to greet Charlie's visitors.

"Morning, Bells. You remember Billy black?" Dad asked.

I smiled, offering my hand, "hey, yeah. You're looking good." 

Billy shook my hand, smiling, a twinkle in her eyes, "Still dancing, but I'm glad you're finally here. Charlie here hasn't been able to shut up about it since your told him you were coming," 

"Okay, keep exaggerating and I'll roll you down the hill, lady," Dad rolled his eyes.

I chuckled and turned to the guy beside Billy, "Hey," I greeted, with a smile. 

"Hi, I'm Jacob, we, um, we used to make mud pies when we were little," he smiled shyly.

He had a pretty smile, and beautiful long black hair that I almost envied. His dark eyes were wide with innocence. 

"Oh yeah, I remember." I actually didn't, but I didn't want to make him feel bad. 

Dad interrupted whatever Jacob was going to say, "so, what do you think?"

I furrowed my eyebrows, confused, "about what?"

He moved toward the truck Jacob and Billy had come in and hit it slightly with his hand, "Your homecoming present."

"No jodas!" I didn't have to drive around in his cruiser!

"Watch that mouth!" Dad joked, though he didn't care.

"this is awesome, thank you. I hope it's not a joke..."

He laughed and opened the driver's side door, "it's not, figured you didn't want your old man to drive you around in a cop car,"

"you figured right, old man," I smiled at him and pulling him in for a rare hug.

After receiving my, for once, welcomed surprise, we all retreated inside for lunch. In my case the sandwiches we had were late breakfast. Dad, Billy and Jacob then moved to the living room to catch a basketball game that I couldn't really follow along to, before Billy and Jacob' ride arrived. 

We waved then off from the porch, well dad did, I wasn't about to unnecessarily leave the warmth of the inside. 

I had anxiety driving to school the next day. I changed my outfit three times in the morning and tried to do something with my wild head of curls, thanking Dad sarcastically for them in my head. I tried to make something to eat, but the smell of the eggs I was making made me want to throw up and they ended up in the garbage. I paced around the living room for half an hour before I absolutely had to leave, or I was going to be late. Dad had already left and normally having the house to myself would cause some excitement in me, but I was a nervous wreck.

Finding the only high school in town was not a challenge, finding parking surprisingly was. The lot was full of students loitering around. And I let out a sigh of relief when I saw most of them had old beat up cars like mine. Though there were a few nice expensive ones that I was shocked to see. 

I found a spot by the doors and quickly parked sloppily, getting out and pulling my jacket's hood over my head. I definitely didn't want attention; this is my way to act inconspicuous. Though, it proved useless when an Asian guy suddenly appeared next to me.

"Hi! You're Isabella Swan, right? The new girl," he smiled, and walked with me.

I looked around, why me? "um, yeah, it's just Bella, though."

"oh right, I'm Eric. The eyes and ears of this place. Is there anything you need? I could be your tour guide, we can set up a lunch date if your need a shoulder to cry on?" his words left his mouth fast, in my anxious state I barely caught them.

I shook my head, I didn't even know where I was walking at this point, "I'm actually a suffer in silence type, but you can help me find my way to the office?" 

Do I really want him hanging around me, though? I thought after the words left my mouth.

He laughed, opening the school doors for us to walk through, and I was relieved to find it warm inside. "that's a good headline for the feature, I'm on the paper, I can give you the front page,"

Absolutely not, "oh no, if you don't mind, please don't."

"that's cool, no feature. The office's this way," he gestured down the crowded hall.

I followed Eric, who was helpful and talkative. He stayed with me as I collected my class schedule and even showed me where most of my classes were, stating that he we had a few shared classes. 

When I looked at my schedule I just knew the universe was against me, I had Gym first thing in the morning, sadly followed by Trig, which thankfully it was followed by English, Lunch came in fourth period, too early in my opinion but at least Art and Spanish were last, a language I has been able to speak since I could talk and a subject too hard to fail, giving me an opening to skip it when I felt like going home early. 

But my mornings got a lot worse in my opinion, who would subject me to the cruel punishment that was first period gym? 

Eric walked me to the Gym, looking at me with pity. I thanked him as I walked in. 

There were a few students inside, the bell had yet to ring. I decided used this time to talk to the gym coach, who's name I forgot the second it left his mouth. I asked if I could observe today, but he laughed and shook his head, telling me that I should know by now how a gym class works. This caused me to flip him off once he walked away.

Today half of the students were playing basketball, while half played Volleyball. I had been picked to play the latter, and I wasn't happy about it. Nevertheless, I stayed in the back hoping the ball would never come my way. But again, the universe laughed in my face when three minutes into the game it came flying towards me. With wide eyes I swatted my hand at it, it flew away toward the basketball players, hitting a guy on the head. 

My hands flew to cover my face, and I walked over to apologize. 

"I'm so sorry! I told them not to let me play," I said, he had turned and was rubbing the back of his head.

"Oh, no. It's okay... Hey, You're the new girl, Isabella, right?" he asked, giving me what I assumed was supposed to be a charming smile.

Resisting the urge to roll my eyes, I replied, "It's just Bella,"

He nodded, "I'm Mike," 

He offered me his hand and I awkwardly took it, "Nice to meet you," 

Just then, a girl ran over to us, "She's got a great spike, huh? Hey, you're from Arizona, right?"

"uh, Yeah." I really didn't want to keep talking to them.

"is that how you got your tan? It's beautiful, I'm Jessica, by the way." She smiled. 

I looked her over, "no that's just my skin, my dad is afro Latino," I informed with a roll of my eyes.

"oh, you're the police chief's daughter right," she cocked her head.

"yup, I'll see you guys later," I wasted no more time in rushing away, not giving either of them a chance to pull me back into a conversation. 

The rest of class went by painfully, I took my place in the back and thankfully the ball didn't return back to me. I suspected my teammates knew keeping the ball away from me would be the best option for them if they had a winning chance. After, I dragged myself over to trig where I mostly tuned everything out, due to the headache I was getting from Eric's talking, who decided to sit next to me. English came fast, they were reading Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliette, which I had already read in my last school. Normally, I would look forward to lunch, but this time my newfound friend Jessica decided to approach me to invite me to sit with her. My inability to be rude to people unless provoked caused me to say a regretful yes and that was how I found myself seated in a crowded lunch table. 

"This is Angela, Bella." Jessica gestured to the girl sitting next her. 

She was a pretty Asian girl with glasses that slid off her face every few seconds. 

I went to say hi when I was suddenly blinded by a flash.

"sorry, I needed a candid for the feature." She stated, biting her lip as she looked over the picture she had taken.

I blinked at her, not knowing what to say.

Beside her Eric felt the need to speak up for me. "Feature's dead, Angela, don't bring it up again," he turned, telling me, "I got your back, baby." Before getting up and walking off.

"don't call me baby." I rolled my eyes, and turned to Angela, "I'm sorry, it's just..."

Angela shook her head, cutting me off, "No, it's okay, we'll just run another editorial on teen drinking,"

I nodded. "Hm, you know you could always go for eating disorders. . . or speedo padding on the swim team,"

Jessica raised an eyebrow at me then turned to Angela, "Kirk,"

"Right! That's exactly what I thought!" Angela laughed.

I looked away from them, taking a sip from the soda I had gotten. That's when I saw them, they were beautiful. They looked like airbrushed models who make you feel insecure when you looked inside any fashion magazine. Yet, they were better looking than any model I had ever seen in any magazines. They were sitting in the farthest table of the cafeteria, in a lonely corner by the windows, not looking at anyone or even each other. All of them had dark eyes, even from where I was sitting, I could tell that beneath those eyes were purplish circles. Like they hadn't slept well in years. But that imperfection didn't take away from their beauty.

There were three beautiful guys, and two extraordinary women. One of the guys had dark hair, his skin was a pretty brown color that reminded me of my dad's. He was huge and usually that would mean scary looking, but something about his face was playful and carefree. The second guy was tall, even sitting down I could still see he had to be unusually tall, his hair was buzzed short, it seemed like a shadow on top of his head. His skin was pale, but some color seemed to be struggling to come through. The guy next to him had a pained look on his face, like he was struggling to be in the room. He was tall, but smaller than the other two guys. His hair was a golden blonde that seemed to glow.

The first girl my eyes went to was intimidating, she looked mean, but she was also otherworldly beautiful. She looked to be the tallest out of the two girls, her blonde made her look more intimidating, her skin was pale too, but with a slight warm tone to it, her color seemed unusually muted. 

And then there was the last girl, she had to be the most beautiful out of all of them, I thought, with her bronze colored hair, hair that was messily curled but in a beautiful way that I tried but failed to achieve, and her fair skin. I almost gasped out loud when I saw her pink heart shaped lips and her gorgeous eyes, though they seemed to be missing some light in them. They made me surprisingly sad, where did the light go? How could I bring it back?

I turned back to Jessica, asking, "Um, who are they?"

She turned to me, then looked over at the people I had been gawking at, laughing before answering, "Those are the Cullen's, they, uh, they're Dr. and Mrs. Cullen's foster kids. They moved down from Alaska a few years ago,"

Angela joined her in explaining, "They kind of keep to themselves,"

"Yeah, cause they're all together," Jessica lowered her voice as if she was spilling a big secret, "Like together, together. . . It's weird."

"Jess! They're not actually related..." Angela shook her head.

"yeah but they lived together, its fucking weird. Okay, the blond guy's name is Jasper and he's with the tall dark-haired guy, Archie. The blonde girl, her name is Rosalie and she's with Emmett, the other guy. And then, Edythe, she's not with anyone or anything, but all the guys around here want to hook up with her. Of course, she always says no."

I nodded and turned back, looking at the beautiful family again. I was surprised to find one of them looking back at me. It was the beautiful bronze haired girl, Edythe, and I couldn't look away, her dark eyes held me. She was the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. She looked back at me, her eyebrows were furrowed in a look of confusion. She wasn't looking away and I couldn't break our eye contact. It was as if her eyes held mind captive and they had Stockholm Syndrome. Like she was trying to figure something out, but what was there to figure out about me? Our weird eye contact was broken when Archie, who was sitting next to Edythe, elbowed her, taking her attention away.

I looked away, back to Jessica. "their parents are amazing, taking in all those kids,"

Jessica looked like she didn't agree, "yeah, I guess. Dr. Cullen is really young, in her thirties. She couldn't have kids; I think neither could her wife. Rosalie and Jasper are twins they have been with them since they were little. Mrs. Cullen is their aunt." My heart soared with warmth at fact that two Sapphic women lived in this town, raising a beautiful group of kids.

"are you talking about the Cullen's?" Mike inserted himself in the conversation, sitting down in the empty seat next to me.

Jessica scoffed, "Why? Are you going to tell Bella the amount of times Edythe has turned you down?" 

His face turned several shades of red before he got up and walked away muttering, "I, shut up," under his breath.

I laughed, looking back over at Edythe. Her face was turned away, but from the shape of her round cheek, she seemed to be hiding a smile. 

Just then, they all got up and began walking away. It was a bizarre sight, looking at them in motion together. They walked gracefully, as if they were walking down the runway in a Fashion show in Milan. It was kind of weird.

A second later, the bell sounded through the room signaling the end of lunch. Angela and I said goodbye to Jessica and continued off to Biology together. One of the things I decided I liked about Angela was that she didn't need to talk my ear off, Angela stayed quite the whole way there. But it wasn't awkward, it was appreciated it. She led the way into the classroom, smiling back at me before taking a seat.

I looked around, my eyes finding Edythe sitting alone at a table. This time, she looked away quickly before Edythe noticed me staring. Taking a deep breath, I walked up to the Biology teacher and introduced myself. 

"Welcome, Bella. I'm Mr. Banner. You can have a seat, next to miss Cullen." He gestured towards, Edythe, but he didn't have to. I hadn't forgotten her name, or her face.

I nodded, my heart falling down to my stomach. 

Surely this wasn't happening to me. I thought.

I took my second-deep breath within minutes and looked toward my new lab partner. Edythe was looking back at me, but this time she didn't have a look of confusion, she seemed mad. More than mad, she was pissed. 

I guess she prefers working alone. 

I looked away and walked over taking to my seat without a word. Edythe moved away, causing me to look over at her. Her face wasn't angered anymore, she looked to be in pain. 

She seems to go through emotions quickly...

I looked away, again, turning to Mr. Banner. 

He began his class with a clap, "Alright, class, today we will be observing the behavior of Planaria, aka flatworms..." his voice faded away as I became aware of a pair of eyes on me.

So, I looked down, framing my face with my hair. The tangled curls helping my face become invisible to Edythe's burning gaze.

What was with her? I thought, becoming irritated and uncomfortable; my temper was being provoked, and I looked back up and over to Edythe.

She was looking at me, pushing me to say, "Do you think you can, I don't know, stop looking at me?"

Edythe raised an eyebrow, a small crooked smile formed on her lips and she looked away. For the rest of the class I paid no attention, I was annoyed and hungry. I didn't even want to be here anymore. 

Edythe Cullen is weird, I concluded, weird and beautiful.

My first day at Forks High School sucked, needless to say. After snapping at Edythe, the bell seemed to take forever to ring, and just a second before it actually did ring, Edythe was already out of her seat and through the door before anyone else even moved or had the chance to process that they had been dismissed. I had rolled my eyes and went about my day, wanting to get it over with and go home and be reunited with my bed. But Edythe Cullen proved difficult to avoid, when I had returned to the office to return the pass, they had given me for my teachers to sign, Edythe was there. She had been arguing with the secretary about changing her fifth period biology class to anything else, and as soon as I had walked in Edythe's posture stiffened, she muttered something about enduring it and left. Not sparing me another look.

Was this all about me? Did she not like me enough that she would go out of her way to get out of being my lab partner in one class? I asked myself, Edythe confused me, I had only muttered a few words to her and even before then it seemed like Edythe hated me. 

After handing the secretary my pass, I rushed away to find Edythe. 

I wanted to demand to know what her problem was. She had no reason to hate me and I was not going to continue feeling like shit over a pretty girl. Though, what's new? 

I didn't go out of my way to find her, but the whole way to my truck I was looking around for Edythe. It wasn't until I got to the parking lot that I saw her and three out of four of her siblings standing around an expensive looking car. I recognized it from Phil's car calendar as a Porche. It was sleek black and somehow, I thought it matched her perfectly, though I wasn't even sure who the car belonged to. 

I debated marching over and making a scene in front of her family. But as I stepped forward to cross the lot, Archie looked away from his stare down with Edythe and looked right at me, causing me to freeze. He subtly shook his head at me before Edythe herself decided to look over. Her face became annoyed and with a roll of her eyes she pushed passed Archie and into the drivers' seat of the ridiculously fancy car.

"Bitch," I muttered under my breath, looking at the tinted window that concealed Edythe.

Archie's laughter caused me to look back at him, his head was thrown back his eyes closed to the sky as his shoulders shook. 

Had he heard me? I asked myself before shaking my head, he was too far away to have heard me. 

I turned away, I was still angry and annoyed and even a little hurt. I fought back the urge to stump my feet all the way to the truck. I didn't spare the Cullen's a second thought as I jumped in and turned it on, throwing the truck in reverse and joining the long line of cars trying to get out through the only exit. 

As I waited in the line of cars, I noticed someone was causing traffic, which added to my annoyance. The fact that I was stuck close to the Cullen's didn't make it any better. But I tried not to look over at them, but from the corner of my eye I could see the rest of the Cullen's being joined by Emmett before they all got in the car. The line started moving, and I stepped off the break just as Edythe decided to back out of the lot, making me rush to step back on to the break as a burst of adrenaline shot through me. I was livid, honking at Edythe just as she made her escape in a move I had only ever seen in movies. 

She was out of her mind. That's what I thought of Edythe Cullen.


	2. Open Book

My second day at Forks High School was better... and worse. It was better because the rain didn't make an appearance during the night, finally letting me have a good night's sleep, and when I woke up it was still missing. Though, by the dark clouds covering the skies that it's return was certain. 

It was worse because Edythe Cullen also seemed to disappeared with the rain. I didn't know why Edythe's absence made my day worse, I figured it was because I had been planning to confront her. But a part of me also wandered if it was actually because I just really liked looking at her, regardless of the annoyance she instills in me. 

And when Edythe's siblings came into lunch without her, I felt a little disappointed. 

My day also sucked because by the end of it the rain came back with full force, but I just couldn't go home to hide. I had to go to the supermarket. It was no secret that both of my parents are shit cooks, Dad ate out pretty much every day. Something I would normally not be against, but I wanted to stay indoors and away from the cold rainy weather as much as possible. So, until I could say goodbye to Forks, I was on cooking duty. 

By the time Dad got home from work I had already put the groceries away and was nearly finished frying the chicken. 

"What's for dinner?" he had asked with a worried tone. I guessed he remembered what a terrible cook mom was.

"Chicken, rice and beans," I answered him. 

He stood around for a minute before he went and set the table. 

Dinner was mostly quiet. Until Dad decided to remind me of school.

After a few minutes he asked, "So, how's school going? Made any friends yet?"

I resisted the urge to roll her eyes, not at my dad, but at the thought of the people in school.

I finished chewing then answered, "It's going good, I made a few friends."

He nodded, "Anyone I know?"

In a town this small? Probably. "I don't know, there's this girl Jessica and also Angela,"

"Jessica Stanley and Angela Weber, both are good girls," he replied.

"Jessica's a bit ignorant, she asked if I got my tan living in Arizona," I chuckled.

This made Dad laugh louder than I had ever heard coming from him, "you got that color from me,"

"There's also Mike and Eric, sooner or later I'm going to have to break it to them that I'm a raging lesbian," I laughed.

He chuckled, "and thank god for that, men are no good. That Mike is no exception."

"You don't have to tell me twice,"

Our conversation faded, I wanted to ask Dad about the Cullen's. Edythe was still dancing around in my mind and I was curious about her. 

I finally got my chance to ask when he was cleaning the dishes. 

"dad? What do you know about the Cullen family?" I nervously asked.

He didn't look away from his work while he answered, "Dr. Cullen's family? They're great people,"

I hummed, "Yeah, the kids, though, They don't seem to fit in too much,"

This time he looked over at me with a tsk, "The people in this town always want to hate on the newcomers, those kids are good. They don't give me any trouble, I can't say the same about the Mike's and Jessica's of this town," 

Wow, "Go off, dad." I laughed.

"and Dr. Cullen is a brilliant surgeon who could work anywhere in the world but choose to live in a small town. This place should feel lucky to have her and her family,"

"and they're all good looking, that's a plus," I jokingly, but seriously, added.

He laughed, nodded, "you should see the parents. They really do make a beautiful couple. Half of the staff at the hospital have a tough time concentrating around Dr. Cullen."

"well, that's dangerous." I chuckled.

After Dad finished the dishes, he retreated to the living room to watch TV, while I headed upstairs to shower and do my homework. My Trig homework exhausted my brain, to the point that I actually slept through the pounding rain. 

The next day, I was on edge. Waiting for Edythe to show her face, but again she never showed. At lunch, her siblings sat alone, they barely spoke to each other while picking at their uneaten food. I let myself relax after seeing the empty seat next to mine in biology. And I couldn't help myself from looking over at the Cullen siblings by their car, after school. It was the beginnings of a bad habit that I needed to end. 

This day, they were waiting on Archie. Rosalie and Emmett were in their own little world under the drizzling rain, while Jasper was looking away. I examined them as I walked toward my truck, they were an insanely beautiful couple. His dark skin complemented hers. Like chocolate and caramel, they just went together. His hand rested on her hip as she leaned against the car. Even with their heights you could see that Emmett only had a few inches of height on Rosalie.

It was like looking at a real power couple, both looked like they knew their way around a gym, they should teach me. I then felt eyes on her, and I looked to find Jasper looking back at me. He had caught me looking, and my face heated up, as I looked away, and rushed faster toward my truck.

The rest of my week went by fast, Edythe never returned, and I was becoming more comfortable around most of my new friends. Mike kept hinting his interest in me, something i kept acting oblivious of. It wasn't intentional, I just didn't want or feel like telling him about my sexuality, though I did go out of my way to show I wasn't interested. He sat with me at all our shared classes and even kept me out of the way of the ball at gym. All while Eric trailed behind glaring at the back of his head. 

Angela was the only person I had felt comfortable enough around to come out to, she was the only one I trusted enough not to tell. And she needed someone to laugh with every time Mike and Eric argued silently about who would sit closest to me at lunch. 

Every day, I looked toward the Cullen's making sure Edythe wasn't there before I could go ahead and join the conversation going on. 

It was mostly about a trip to La Push beach that I had decided on not attending in two weeks. Beaches are supposed to hot, and other the sea, dry. 

On Friday, I had finally convinced myself that Edythe had dropped out of school and had run away to Brazil. I was comfortable entering biology without my heart threatening to burst through my chest. 

My first weekend in Forks was boring, as predicted. I stayed home, moving things around in my room and talking to mom on the phone. Dad was busy working and he always had food waiting for him when he got home, we would eat together then go our separate ways. 

Monday came faster than I thought possible, I got through my morning classes and headed to the cafeteria with Mike. A surprise was waiting for us when we exited the building. 

"Wow, it's snowing!" Mike was excited about the snow.

I was not, "Fucking great,"

He turned to me confused, "you don't like snow?"

I shook my head, snow falling off my hair and to the ground, "No, fuck, no. it just means it's too cold for rain,"

"is this your first time seeing snow?"

"Of course not, I've seen it in movies." I shrugged.

He laughed at me, just as a ball of snow came crashing into the back of his head. We both turned in the direction it came from, Eric was a few feet away from us, walking in the opposite direction of the cafeteria. Mike seemed to suspect him too, because he bent down to grab snow and that was my cue to leave. 

During my power walk to the cafeteria, Jessica joined me. She was laughing, and her hair was dripping with melting ice.

"Hey, Bella. Isn't it awesome? The snow!" she greeted, shaking her wet hair, some drops landed on me and I hissed at the coldness of it hitting my skin.

"No, and if anyone decides to throw snow at me, I'll kill them." I said seriously as we walked into the crowded room.

She laughed at me as if I was joking, and we joined the line for food. 

"We should have a snowball fight afterschool," she said excitedly.

I groaned, grabbing a coke and some chips, "Don't count me in,"

Jessica talked animatedly about her snowball fiasco throughout their whole walk to the table, I tried to tune her out. Hoping for Angela to finally come and save me from Jessica. 

Jessica finally turned her conversation to Mike when he joined. And I decided to sneak a look toward the Cullen's, which made my heart stop when I realized five people were sitting there today.

Fuck. 

They looked like they belonged in a movie, Emmett had his hair saturated with melting snow. He was shaking his head at Rosalie and Archie as they leaned away from him, but they couldn't escape the water as it kept landing on their jackets. They were all laughing, enjoying the snowy day like everyone else.

I looked at Edythe, her laughter made her more beautiful than I thought possible. She looked different than she did the last time I saw her, her soft looking skin was less pale and more vibrant. The purple circle beneath her eyes were less noticeable. 

I was trying to pinpoint any other changes, but I was caught red handed before I could notice anything else.

"What're you looking at, Bella?" Jessica pulled me back in, just as Edythe began looking in my direction.

I looked away, turning away and angling my body toward Jessica. 

Jessica looked over my shoulder, "Um, Edythe Cullen is looking at you,"

"Does she look mad?" I asked.

Jessica looked back at me, "No? why would she?" 

"I don't think she likes me very much," I admitted.

Jessica laughed, "The Cullen's don't like anybody, don't feel too bad. She's still looking..."

"okay, enough. Stop looking at her." I hissed.

She laughed but turned away, "Maybe she's gay. What if she likes you? That would explain why she's never gone out with any of the guys around here!"

She sounded as if she'd made some big discovery and I had to laugh, just as she turned toward Lauren to discuss her unfounded theory. 

I then turned to Angela, who had joined us quietly while I was distracted looking at a girl that was in my opinion way out of my league, "I can't with her,"

Angela laughed, nodding in agreement.

All throughout the lunch hour, I had butterflies in my stomach. How was I going to sit next to Edythe in Biology? I didn't want a repeat of last week, and I had long since lost any nerve I had to confront Edythe. 

I never looked back at The Cullen's table, I even left early with Angela hoping to get there before Edythe. Mr. Banner was the only one in the Biology room when we got there, and he allowed us to sit while waiting for everyone else to join.

I laid my head down on the table and concentrated on breathing, hoping to calm the anxiety I was feeling along with the butterflies flying around in my stomach. Though, both got worse when I heard Edythe's chair move, signaling her arrival. 

"Hello," said her quite musical voice. 

I got up, looking at Edythe through wide eyes. Who was sitting as far away from me as possible, but her chair was angled toward me. 

I looked her over, Edythe's hair was a wet, tangled mess of curls and she had a friendly smile on her heart shaped lips, the dimples in her round cheeks made my heart stutter. 

"My name is Edythe Cullen," she continued, her careful eyes on my face, "I didn't get a chance to introduce myself last week, you must be Bella,"

I was confused, why was she talking to me? And what was I supposed to say back to her? 

But my mouth seemed to work alone, because I then said; "I'm not surprised, with all the glaring you did."

To my surprised, Edythe laughed, "sorry about that, I wasn't in my right mind. I had been going through something, that's why I haven't been here," 

This time I seemed to take charge my words, "Oh, its fine."

The conversation died when Mr. Banner began the class. I tried to pay attention, but I was in my own head about the fact the Edythe actually talked to me. And that she actually apologized. 

My were snapped back to earth when Mr. Banner announced that we would be working with our partners today. To me this meant more opportunities to further embarrass myself in front of Edythe. 

The lab today was one I had done before.

My mistakes should be minimal, I shrugged to myself. 

"So, identify the phases of mitosis, and after I'll show you some slides up on the projector and you can correct yourselves," Mr. Banner explained, and everyone got to work at once.

"May I?" Edythe asked, gesturing toward the microscope.

I could only look and nod. 

It's a good thing my skin was dark, otherwise she would've been able to see the flush of blood surfacing in my face. I told myself.

Edythe looked away sharply before grabbing the microscope, pulling it toward her. She seemed to have been holding her breath as she looked through the scope for half a second, maybe less, and stating, "Metaphase,"

I raised an eyebrow, and Edythe looked at me, "did you want to check?"

"No, I trust you,"

Edythe nodded before writing the answer down on their worksheet, then moving on to the next slide. 

Hey, if she wanted to do all the work, I'm not going to stop her. I'm too busy looking at her to care about sharing the work. I wanted to laugh at my own thought, but I fought against the risk of looking crazy.

Again, Edythe only wasted a moment in identifying the slide, "Prophase,"

This time, I wrote down the response, wishing I hadn't after seeing my messy handwriting next to Edythe's perfect one. 

I looked back at her, she was switching slides again when she suddenly looked up just a second before Mr. Banner said; "Miss Cullen?"

"Yes, Mr. Banner?" she spoke in a polite voice, as she slid the microscope towards me.

"Maybe, you should give Miss Swan an opportunity to do her share of the work?" 

"Of Course," she replied before turning back to me with a nod.

And suddenly I was painfully aware of Edythe's eyes on me as I looked through the scope. I thought Edythe watching me was only fair seeing as I had been doing the same. But it still made me hyperaware of my own movements, and I felt awkward.

I pulled back after a few seconds, "Anaphase,"

"May I have a look?" Edythe asked, and I moved to push the microscope back to her just as she place her hand around it, our hands touched, and I jerked away like I had been burned. But actually, Edythe's hands were freezing, not hot. Though that was not why I'd jerked away like she had some kind of sickness, it was the fact that Edythe's touch was electric.

Edythe muttered an apology before looking through the scope.

"Anaphase," she echoed me.

"Looks like you're not the only smart one," I joked, talking like I had been running a marathon.

"Perhaps not," Edythe smiled back at me, flashing the dimples that made the butterflies in my stomach fluttered some more.

I smiled and went to change the slide, but it seemed like Edythe's touch also intoxicated me because I dropped both the slide I was changing and the last slide we had left to identify. One of them fell on the table, thankfully not shattering, but the other bounced off and was heading toward the floor. I braced myself for the sound of broken glass, but Edythe had already caught it. 

"Nice reflexes, thanks," I breathed.

Edythe chuckled, "Not a problem, we don't need it anyway. It's not a mystery," 

She wrote done both Anaphase and Telophase in their respective spots on our worksheets then turned to me.

"It's too bad about the snow, isn't it?" she nodded toward the window.

I glanced over, the rain had replaced the snow and was melting what remained on the ground, "Oh thank fucking god,"

Her musical laugh filled the space around them, "You don't like the snow?"

I laughed a little before answering, it felt awkward and force, "Not at all, I hate cold and rainy weather,"

"Well, you picked a wonderful place to live. Were you exiled here against your will?" 

I looked in her eyes, "No, I exiled myself, actually."

Edythe crooked her head, her face morphed into a look of confusion. And I thought it was fucking adorable, "Why?"

I knew the answer, but I didn't really want to. 

Would she really care about how I ended up in this hellhole?

"I don't really know how to answer," I replied.

"You can start at the beginning?" Edythe suggested, inclining a bit forward as if she had just gotten the most exciting interview of her life.

So, I did, "Well, my mom remarried and he's a minor league baseball player, so he travels a lot. I didn't want to keep her home unhappy with me, so I decided to come live with my dad for a while." 

"That doesn't sound too complicated," 

All while I was answering her, I finally could see the last thing different about her, and again my brain and mouth filter stopped working together and I asked; "Did you get contacts?" 

Edythe looked confused by my random question and leaned away as the blood returned to my face. "No,"

"Oh, there's just something different about your eyes." 

They were like golden honey pools that I wanted to get lost in, though last week they were a pit of black. I had seen my own hazel eyes do that, change colors from green to blue to the ugliest yellow, but I had never seen deep dark black eyes do that. It was strange, and I didn't know how I didn't notice it before, maybe I was too preoccupied with my heart palpitations. 

Edythe became a statue and I looked down at my feet, noticing Edythe's hands were clenched into fists. 

"Are you unhappy now?" her voice made me look back up, finding that she was already looking and leaning toward me, curiosity in her golden eyes.

Her question caught me off guard, "About living in Forks?" 

Edythe only nodded.

"I..." no one had asked me that, and for a moment I battled with myself about it inside my head. Was I unhappy? I didn't think so, but I did feel a jolt of sadness as I thought back to my mom and the warm weather, even some of the friends I had, which I hadn't gotten around to replying to their messages. 

I came back down, only to find Edythe looking at me in frustration.

Right, I hadn't answered, "I'm thinking about it, I'll let you know when I figure it out." Somehow my answer only enhanced her frustrated look. "am I annoying you, again or something?"

She leaned back, "No, I'm annoying myself."

"how so?" it was my turn to be curious.

"it's just, I'm particularly good at reading people. But with you, it's different. I don't know what to make of you yet," I grinned, "is that funny?" Edythe cocked her head.

She was like a cute kitten, curious and adorable. "No," I laughed a little. "my mom calls me her open book, she says she reads every thought I have on my face."

Edythe straightened her head, and looked at me through intense, half glaring eyes. Almost as if she was trying to read me like my mom did.

"Are you like an empath or something? Have you lost your psychic abilities because of me?" I half joked, I believed in brujeria, after all.

Edythe laughed, "I suppose maybe I have gotten overconfident."

"Sorry I made you lose your ability." Ugh, those dimples.

"I forgive you." she smiled.

Just then, Mr. Banner called the class to order, and I was relieved to take a break from the roller coaster ride that was Edythe Cullen. She made me and the butterflies too nervous. But also happy that she was interested, or seemed, interested in getting to know me. The possibility of Edythe liking girls and me actually having a chance with her was making me dizzy, but I didn't know if I was getting way too ahead of myself because I'm a self-proclaimed dumb gay, or because Edythe was just simply intoxicatingly beautiful and intriguing. Smart too, how was that fair? Where were her flaws? I guess Edythe getting easily annoyed counts as one. 

I snuck a look back over at her, she was leaned away and gripping the edge of the table. 

I didn't even try to pay attention to Mr. Banner, nothing he could say, or show on the projector, could bring me back from space. 

Finally, the bell rang, Edythe muttered a goodbye to me then went straight out of the door with grace and swiftness. 

Sadly, for me, Mike took it as a chance to come over to me as I was moving toward the door, Angela was busy talking to Mr. Banner and told us not to wait for her. Making me curse at her in my head.

"That was awful, you don't know how lucky you are to have Edythe as your cousin... I mean, partner... why did I say cousin...?" 

I laughed, for once Mike had said something funny. Though unintentional. 

I looked at him and he looked actually proud, which made me stop. 

"I knew what I was doing too," I stated, after. 

"lucky," he groaned, "It seemed like she was friendly today,"

On our way to History, I stopped listening to Mike's small talk. I had two periods left before I free from school. In most of my classes, they were teaching the same thing I had already learned in my last school. That was the only benefit I had gotten from moving to a new school in March. So, as Mrs. Brown taught about the civil war, I paid no attention and began doodling in the back of my notebook. This happened in Spanish also, seeing as it was my first language and I thought it was a joke that they were making me even take this class. And in art class, where I turned my doodle into a piece of art by painting it. Afterwards realizing that I was looking into two cat-like eyes, eyes that were the color of golden honey that looked back at her curiously. 

I murmured a "Fuck," and pushed the drawing into my bag. 

When I walked outside, the rain had taken all the snow and turned into a light mist, making me shiver and walk faster to my truck. As soon as I was inside, I jammed the key into the ignition and started it, blasting the heat. Though, the air came out cold, I waited for it to heat up.

I then turned to make sure my way was clear when I noticed Edythe standing three empty parking spaces away from me. She was leaned against the driver's side of her car, looking down at her shoes. Though, with my luck as soon as I noticed her, she looked up at me. She smiled at back at me and I awkwardly waved back before turning and reversing, in my rush to stop further embarrassment, I almost hit an old Toyota. But, luckily for the driver, I stepped back on the brake before my truck put it to rest. 

From my peripheral vision I could tell Edythe was laughing. So, I turned and saw that she was joined by her brother, Archie, who was also laughing. I glared playfully at them through my embarrassment before double checking that my way was clear to head home.

Today was weird.


	3. Phenomenon

The next morning, for the first time ever, I got ready without dragging my feet, I was well rested and actually excited to get to school. And it had nothing to do with brain stimulation and the learning environment, but everything to do with Edythe Cullen. I had never been this giddy over a girl, hell I've never even had a girlfriend to be giddy about. And none of my crushes felt quite like this, surprising, because I tended to fall for women that scared me. So, I got ready for my day, and ate some cereal before I opened the front door and stopping dead in my tracks.

"This is a fucking joke," I said to myself. 

Had I slept through a blizzard? There was snow everywhere, it was bright white and hurt my eyes. I stood for a good five minutes staring in disbelief. To top it all off the rain from yesterday had frozen solid, ice covered the trees and some patches on the street and sidewalk. How was I going through make it through today without incident? I had trouble staying up right with dry ground and now I had to deal with ice and snow. I debated going back to bed, for my safety, but I finally walked down the steps carefully and jumped in my truck.

I drove carefully, I had never had to deal with ice and snow while driving. I was tense and scared throughout the whole ride but somehow, I made it to school and parked without problem. A miracle, I suppose.

When I got out a shiny reflection coming from my back tires caught my eye. I walked over to the back of my truck, bending a little while holding on to my truck, to further inspect and realized that this was the miracle that got me to school safely.

Dad had gotten up early to put snow chains on my tires. I guess he too knew that I wasn't going to make it without them. I thanked him in my head, that was something my mom would've never been able to do. 

I was straightening up when I heard a strange sound, it was a high-pitched screech that nearly scared me to death. Just as it registered in my ear I jumped up and turned toward the source. My eyes widening at what I saw. 

Nothing happened in slow motion like the movies, but the adrenaline rush made my brain work faster. So, I saw several things at once. The first was Edythe, standing four cars away, she was looking right at me, her mouth was hanging open and her face was morphed into a look of utter horror. The second, was the dark blue van skidding out of control, its tires locked and screeching against the brakes and spinning against the ice of the parking lot. Also, it was coming straight at me to crush me against my own truck. I didn't even have the time to shut my eyes in anticipation of my Final Destination-like death. 

Just before I heard the metals colliding, something tackled me from the opposite direction. My head hit hard against the icy asphalt, and someone's cold body was pressing me down onto the ground. I barely had time to register that I was on the ground next to the black car I'd parked next to, before realizing that the van was still coming. It was now curled gratingly around the end of my truck, still spinning and sliding, trying to crush me again.

"Come on!" her voice was fierce, angry. 

Her hands shooting out in front of me, and with a loud metallic thud, the van stopped dead in its tracks a foot away from my face, her hand fitting the dent on the van.

The calm after the storm lasted just a second before chaos ensued around me, people were screaming and yelling for 911 to be called. I heard a million different versions of "Bella? Are you okay?" but hers was the only one that was clear. 

"Are you alright, Bella?" 

I groaned, "No,"

Her worried face came into my blurry vision as she pulled my face to look at her and I realized she was holding me against her body, "Where does it hurt?"

"Mi puta vida," I said as I tried to sit up.

"Be careful, I think you hit your head pretty hard," she warned as I struggled against her grip.

Then I noticed the throbbing pain in my head, I stopped struggling, "Fuck, ow."

"That's what I thought," she sounded amused.

"Edythe, I am way too gay for you to be holding me like this," 

She chuckled and helped me up. 

"How did you get over here so fast?" I asked, suddenly recalling what had just happened.

"I was standing right next to you, Bella." She said, her eyes were intense, and all the humor had been drained from her face.

I became confused, and then they found us. A crowd of people shouting and crying.

"Don't move!" someone instructed.

Another shouted, "Get Taylor out the van!" 

There was a flood of activity around us and I tried to get up only to be stopped by Edythe as she pushed down on my shoulder.

"just stay still until they get to us,"

"But I'm freezing," I frowned, and she chuckled under her breath.

"you were over there, by your car," I remembered.

Her expression changed again, "No I wasn't."

"But I saw you," everything around me was confusing. I heard the low voices of the adults who were now joining the scene, but I stubbornly wanted to argue with Edythe about why she was lying.

"Bella," she said my name with fire, "I was standing with you, I pulled you out of the way,"

She looked me dead in the eyes, it was like she was trying to hypnotize me with her golden orbs. Her face was anxious, like she was trying to tell me something telepathically. But I was too stubborn, I wanted the truth.

"That's not what happened,"

It was like her eyes were glowing, "Bella, please. Trust me,"

And I did, she had just saved my life after all, "Okay," sirens rang, "will you explain later?"

She scowled, "Fine,"

"K," I frowned at her.

I didn't understand, I never understood much of what went on in my life. But, this was impossible, I knew that, I also knew that it happened. One second, she was nowhere near me, and then in the next she was stopping a whole fucking van from killing me. It was impossible, but it happened, so why was she trying to convince me that what I saw was just a fragment of my imagination?

As I tried to make sense of my latest near-death experience, six EMTs and two teachers managed to shift the van away from us in order to bring the stretchers closer. Edythe managed to talk herself out of being put in one, and just as I tried to do the same, she contradicted me. I felt betrayed as she threw words like concussion and hemorrhage at the EMTs, who had to force me into a neck brace and then onto the stretcher. I wanted to kill her.

And then everything seemed to get worse, dad had arrived on the scene as they were loading me into the ambulance.

"Bella!" he yelled in a panic making me flinch. 

"I'm fine, dad," I sighed. 

He dismissed me, looking at the closest EMT for a second opinion, who tried to talk him down. My head was filled with everything that had just happened, from the feeling of flying until I landed hard on the ground with her strong body pining to the ground, to her hand flashing out to stop the vans insistence in killing me. The dent that it left, a dent that was the perfect fit for her small, not so fragile hand. And then, there was her family, who didn't wear faces of concern for their little sister. There was disappointment on Emmett and Jasper's faces, and then there was Rosalie, who's fury could not only be seen on her face but felt all the way across the lot. There was no logical explanation, and I sure as hell am not having a mental breakdown.

Chief Swan insisted in giving the ambulance a police escort to the hospital, something I tried to stop. I was annoyed the whole time they were unloading me from the back, this was ridiculous and unnecessary. I was sent in straight to triage, glaring the whole time the nurse took my pressure, and temperature. And as soon as she walked off I took of the stupid neckbrace, throwing it under the bed they had set me up in. 

Taylor was brought in, she wore bandages around her head and arms, she was in worse shape than me. Though she still was looking at me with an anxious look on her face. 

"Bella, I'm so sorry!" she looked like she wanted to cry.

"Don't worry, Taylor, I'm okay. You don't look so good, how are you?" I asked as the nurses began to take of her bandages, exposing the bloody cuts underneath. 

I think I'm going to be sick, I hate blood. 

Taylor ignored my question, "I almost killed you! I thought I was! The way I hit the ice, God, I'm so sorry!" 

I had already looked away from her, and I wasn't going to look back as long as she kept bleeding, but I still reassured her, "it's okay, you missed, there's nothing to apologize for,"

"How did you even get out of the way?"

"oh, um, Edythe pulled me out of the way," I felt like I was lying, even though I wasn't.

"wait, who?"

"Edythe Cullen. . . she was standing right next to me, she reacted much quicker than I did," this time, I knew it was a lie.

"I didn't see her. . . I guess everything happened so fast, she's not hurt too, is she?"

Taylor confirmed what I already knew, Edythe wasn't anywhere near me. But she wanted me and everyone else to think that she was. There was something off about that girl. It's time I stopped trying to think logically and started digging up my grandmother's scary stories from my memories. 

Taylor wouldn't shut up, and I was thankful when they wheeled me away to get X-Rays. When I was being brought back, they let me know that I wasn't concussed, but I still needed to see a doctor. I quietly asked if there was an empty bed far away from Taylor, but luck wasn't with me today. 

I was stuck in the same ER bed, my stomach churning next to a bloody Taylor who wouldn't stop harassing me. No matter how many times I told the girl, who lets be honest, was probably in shock, that I was fine she just kept on and on. So, I closed my eyes and tried to tune her out. 

"Is she asleep?" came her voice, making my eyes snap wide open. 

She was standing at the foot of my bed, wearing an annoying—but hot—smirk. I could only look at her, trying to decipher what she was. 

"Edythe! I'm really sorry!" Taylor began her attack, Edythe was quick to stop her.

"No blood, no foul," she said, flashing her a dazzling dimpled smile and moving to sit on the edge of her bed. 

Should I rule out vampire? She doesn't seem to be bothered by blood, after all. 

Succubus!

I snapped out of my internal battle when Edythe began to speak, "So? What's the verdict?"

"No concussion or a hemorrhaging brain, but I'm still being held against my will," I huffed. "Why aren't you strapped up to a bed like the rest of us?" 

"It's all about who you know around here, but don't worry, I came to spring you," she winked, and I nearly fell off my bed. 

"I heard the Chief's daughter was in," came a voice, I looked, and my mouth fell open. 

A doctor had walked in through the doors, she was young and blond and beautiful. Too beautiful. Too perfect, just like the rest of them. And just like the rest of them she looked tired, her spotless skin was pale. This had to be Dr. Cullen. I almost didn't mind being here anymore. 

"So, Ms. Swan, how are you feeling?" she asked in a gentle, mesmerizing voice.

"I hoped I didn't have to say that I'm fine another time," I sighed.

She laughed as she walked over to the light board beside my bed to view my X-Ray's.

"Your X-Ray's look good, no signs of any current head trauma," she stated, before turning back to me, "does your head hurt? Edythe said you hit the asphalt pretty hard,"

"It's fine," I said, my voice monotone as I looked at Edythe, who avoided my eyes.

I felt Dr. Cullen's cold fingers press lightly against my skull and I winced, were they trying to secure a real head injury. 

"Tender?" she asked.

"Not really, I've had worse," 

"I could tell," Dr. Cullen smiled, Edythe let out a low laugh and I looked at her smiling face.

"Can I leave now?" I asked.

"Sure, your father is in the waiting room. You can go home with him but come back if you feel dizzy or have any trouble with your eyesight." She said.

I shuddered at the thought of my dad playing nurse, "Can't I just go back to school?" 

"You should take it easy and rest today,"

I glanced back at Edythe, "does she get to go back?"

"Someone has to spread the news that we survived," Edythe stated with a shrug. 

"Actually, it looks like more of the school is in the waiting room," Dr. Cullen corrected. 

"Fuck," I murmured. 

Dr. Cullen raise an eyebrow at me, amused she said, "Would you like to stay?"

"No, no, me voy!" I moved quickly, throwing my legs over the side of the bed and standing up so quick that I staggered, Dr. Cullen caught me. 

"I'm okay, just trouble staying upright, but that's normal," I assured her.

"Take some Ibuprofen for the pain," she suggested as she steadied me.

"Okay," I gave up on saying that I was fine.

"Sounds like you were very lucky," she stated.

"Yeah, lucky that Edythe was there to knock me out of the way," I replied, looking to get a change in expression from the kind doctor's face.

"Oh, yes," Dr. Cullen nodded, busying herself with the papers in front of her before turning to Taylor, who had finally shut up. "I'm afraid you'll have to stay a while longer," 

Dr. Cullen began examining Taylor and I moved toward Edythe.

"Can I talk to you for a second?" I whispered. 

Her jaw clenched, and her body became tense as she stepped back away from me.

"Your father is waiting for you, he must be worried," she said.

"it's just a second." I wasn't backing down. 

She glared at me, it wasn't as bad as that first day in biology, but still just as scary. So, I glared back, waiting. With a sigh, she turned and walked swiftly across the room. I had trouble keep up with her, I almost resorted to running. As soon as we were through the double doors and into the hallway outside the ER, she spun around to face me. 

Her face was cold and her voice sounded annoyed when she spoke, "what do you want?"

At this point, I didn't care about how intimidated I was at this weird girl, "You owe me an explanation," I demanded, my voice just as annoyed.

"I don't owe you anything, I saved your life," 

"Why are you acting like this? Not much of a savior now, huh?" I scoffed.

"Bella, you hit your head, you don't know what you're talking about," her stare got colder and I felt chills running up my spine. 

"Yeah, I hit my head, but nothing's wrong with it. I know what I saw and I want to know the truth, you can't just swoop in and save me under impossible circumstance and then try to manipulate me into thinking that I'm fucking crazy?" my face was hot by the end of my outburst and she tensed even more. 

"What do you think happened?" she snapped.

"I know that you were nowhere near me, Taylor didn't see you either. And I know that van should've killed us both, but you stopped it. With your hands. And somehow there's not a single scratch on you! That's what I know and there's no manipulation or compulsion in the world that could make me question it," my breathing was picking up pace alongside my heart. 

She looked at me, eyes wide and incredulous. But even the Oscar worthy face she had on couldn't hide her defensive tone, "You think I stopped the van? With my hands?" her voice questioned my sanity, and I didn't like it. 

I nodded, eyebrows raised, challenging her, "That's what I know," 

She smiled mockingly, "No one will ever believe you, you know,"

Her dimples seemed out of place on her hostile face.

"I'm not going to tell anyone, it's nobodies' business but ours. I just want the truth,"

She looked surprised, her smile dropped, and she cocked her head, "then why does it matter?"

"Because I want to be able to sleep at night without trying to figure out what the fuck just happened," I said. 

"Can't you just thank me and get over it?"

"Thank you," I smiled. 

"You're not going to let this go, are you?" she shook her head.

I mirrored her, "Nope,"

"Well, in that case, I hope you enjoy disappointment," with that she walked away, leaving me with more questions than answers. 

I took a minute standing there, glaring at the door she walked out of, before I turned toward the waiting room door bracing myself for the people behind it. When I pushed through the door, every face I knew in Forks was there, waiting. I quickly found my dad, he rushed toward me just as much as I rushed towards him. 

"There's nothing wrong with me," I breathed out through the tight hug I found myself in. 

"What did the doctor say?" he asked.

"I'll tell you in the car," I said, wanting to get out of here before I was attacked by Jessica, Mike and Eric, who were getting too close to us. 

He nodded, putting an arm around my waist to support me. We moved quickly to the exit and for once I welcomed the coldness. 

"Dr. Cullen saw me, she said I was fine and could go home," I told him on the way to the car.

Dad sighed, "You scared me there, kid, don't do that again," 

We drove in silence; my head was hurting and I never wanted my bed more than I did in this moment. I wanted to sleep away all of the events that had happened. Edythe's impossible save, her defensiveness about said save. 

It wasn't until we got home that dad dropped the bomb on me.

"You should call Amelia. . ." he said, scratching the back of his head, a guilty look spread across his face.

"No. . . you didn't!" I was appalled, betrayed by my own father. 

"Sorry," 

I groaned, rushing to the phone to call my mother. 

She was frantic, I could barely make out what she was saying through her sobs. I assured her I was fine, still she didn't calm. Even after the thirtieth time, she still cried, begging me to come home at once. She wasn't even in Phoenix, there was no home for me to go to. Surprisingly, I didn't give in, no matter how much I wanted to go home, there was something keeping me here. A mystery named Edythe Cullen. Maybe I was obsessed, there's no other logical reason as to why I would turn down an offer to escape Forks. 

After I hung up with mom, I rushed through a shower, swallowed some painkillers, and went to bed. The night was quite for once, and once the pain began to subside, it was easy to find sleep. 

That was the first night I dreamt of Edythe Cullen.


	4. Invitations

In my dream, I was chasing her through the dark woods. But I could never catch up, I never seemed to get close enough. And when I did, she would disappear and reappear farther and farther away from me. The more I ran, calling out her name, the more anxiety build up inside of me, I just wanted to touch her. I just wanted to hold her. I got more frantic and anxious when she began to call my name, and then I woke up. 

It was the middle of the night, the pale moonlight leaked in through my open curtains. Knowing I wouldn't get any sleep for a while, I got up and headed to the kitchen for water. My throat my dry and scratchy, like I really had been screaming her name all night. Not in the way I imagined. 

I returned to my room, sitting on the bay window and looking up at the surprisingly clear night sky. Stray clouds moved slowly through the sky, covering the moon every now and then. I watched them, trying to steer my mind clear of the girl who kept dancing circles around my head. 

With a sigh and a goodbye to the moon, I returned to bed. 

School was hell the week that followed the accident, I woke up with pain on every part of my body and no amount of Tylenol could relieve. But I still forced myself to get up every morning and drag myself to school. Where I became the center of Taylor Crowley's world. She followed me everywhere, walking with me to my classes, none of which I shared with her, and coming up with different ways to make it up to me. Each time I let her know that I was fine, that she should try to get over what happened and leave me alone. But she was persistent, sitting as close to me as possible on our now overcrowded lunch table. Every day, I would make sure to sit in between Angela and Jessica. Somehow, Taylor managed to be more annoying than the latter.

I wasn't the only one who, according to the story I told, almost got hurt also. But no one seemed to be following Edythe around or ask for her version of the story. She was included in every testimony I was asked to give. She was my savior, pulling me out of harms way and nearly getting killed too in the process. All anyone had to say about that was that they hadn't noticed her there. But no one questioned it or claim that she was all the way on the other side of the parking lot and that just couldn't possibly be true. 

I didn't understand how no one else saw her. She was eye catching, she would be the first person I would notice in any situation. The only thing I could come up with was that no one else was as aware of Edythe as I was, no one else was obsessed with looking at her, thinking about her, no one else was busy chasing her every night in their dreams. 

I was starting to feel like a stalker. 

Edythe continued being avoided by the whole school, as usual. She and her siblings sat at their usual table, not eating and talking to only each other. None of them ever even looked my way anymore, she didn't look my way anymore. 

And when she sat beside me in class, she ignored me. Sitting as far away as possible, with her hands forming tight fists every now and then being the only thing that made me question how unaware she really was of me.

On the first day back, I greeted her. 

Saying, "Hi, Edythe," only to get a short nod in return. 

I didn't bother after that. If she wanted to act like a child, I was going to let her. But it still bothered me, I wanted to finish our conversation from the hospital. I wanted to see if her answers would change now that she hopefully knew I wasn't going to tell anyone that there was something about her. Something impossible in nature, supernatural even, in my opinion. 

I watched her, in the cafeteria, in the parking lot before and after school. Like a stalker, I took notice of her golden eyes growing darker and darker as the days passed, only to return back to gold suddenly overnight. And the process back to dark would begin again. 

In class, I would ignore her as much as she did me. I didn't understand her, first she hates me, then she disappears only to come back with questions about me. Then she saves me, only to ignore me once I started asking questions about her. She was hiding something, and I knew too much. She really should've let me die, because I was going to find out one way or another. 

Mom, kept calling twenty times a day all week, demanding to know how I was doing. And Mike began to get more comfortable around me, leaning on my biology table to talk to me before class. Both of us ignored Edythe, as she did us. 

The weeks that passed all looked the same, green and gray. Claustrophobic, I hadn't seen the blue skies since I had arrived. Phil always complained that Phoenix didn't have a change of seasons, but Forks was worse. I would've never known spring was beginning to bloom if Jessica hadn't brought it up.

"Hey, Bella?" she asked as we made our way to the cafeteria.

"Hm?"

"I was wondering if you were going to ask anyone to the spring dance," 

"Oh, no, I'm okay," I shuddered.

"Do you think Mike's going to ask you?"

"I hope not," I almost laughed.

She looked up at me surprised, "Really? Why not?"

"I don't do dances," with boys anyway.

"Oh, do you mind if I tell him that?" she smiled.

"Go for it, you'd be helping me," I said, as we stepped through the cafeteria doors.

The next morning, Mike seemed to be in his feelings. He stayed away from me in Gym. And sat far away from me and Jessica at lunch, I was enjoying this new side of him. The side that kept away from me. 

Though, he did walk with me to biology, staying quite the whole way there but following me to my table and leaning down on it as I took my seat, next to Edythe. 

"So," he started, "Jessica said you don't like dances,"

"yeah, she's right," I nodded, horrified at what I assumed he was going to do.

"Oh, I thought she might've made it up, I think she wants me to take her," he frowned.

"You should!" I smiled, trying to discourage him. "She's great,"

"Yeah, I guess. But I have to ask, would this 'I don't dance' thing change if it was me who was asking?"

From the corner of my eye, I noticed a movement in Edythe, she tilted her head in our direction, like she was listening. 

"No, Mike," I said.

"is there a reason why?" he looked at me, he looked like I had crushed all of his dreams.

I took a deep breath before I said, "Because I'm a huge lesbian,"

His mouth fell open, and his face turned twenty different shades of red, I tried not to laugh.

"Oh, oh, uh okay, yeah. That's—that's cool," he walked off with that and I chuckled under my breath. 

I sighed, closing my eyes, rubbing circles on my temples, trying to relieve the headache that I felt coming. So, I had just come out to Mike. Maybe the whole school depending on how he would react. And on top of that, I had also come out to the girl I was obsessed with. Though she probably already had an idea from my "I'm too gay" comment I had said to her due to head trauma. 

When Mr. Banner began class, I sighed another time and opened my eyes. I snuck a look to my left and was surprised to see Edythe looking back at me, her dark eyes held frustration in them, and I couldn't look away. For what seemed like hours, we were staring at each other, I was too afraid to look away, this was the first sign of acknowledgement I had received from her in weeks. I wanted to hold on to it. 

"Miss Cullen?" Mr. Banner interrupted, taking her eyes away from me. 

"The Krebs Cycle," Edythe answered a question I hadn't heard. 

I looked away, before her eyes could capture mine again, and began to have a stare off with my notebook instead. This feeling couldn't be normal, how was it possible that after six weeks of avoiding each other could she still have this affect on me. It just didn't make sense, she shouldn't have so much control over the way my heart would beat, or how much air went into my lungs. She sure as hell shouldn't have been given the power to materialize fucking killer bees into my stomach. I felt sick. 

"Bella?" her voice calling my name startled me, my breathing and my heart stopped simultaneously. 

I took a second before I looked at her, knowing damn well how my body would react when I looked at her too-perfect-to-be-real face. 

"Yeah?" I asked. 

She didn't say anything, she just smiled at me with those stupidly cute dimples of hers. 

"Okay, so, are you talking to me now?" 

"Not really," she shrugged, still smiling. 

"Okay," I didn't know what else to say, or do. So, I just looked away prepared to ignore her again.

"I'm sorry, I know I'm being very rude, but trust me, it's better this way," she said, when I looked back her smile was gone, and her expression turned serious.

"What does that even mean?" I was confused. 

"It's better if we're not friends," she explained.

I narrowed my eyes at her, trying to uncover the hidden meaning behind her words. 

She looked surprised at my reaction, "what are you thinking?"

I laughed, shaking my head, "Don't worry about what I'm thinking,"

She huffed, frustrated again and I laughed another time. 

The bell rang in that moment and I was surprised that the hour had gone by so quickly. I gathered my books and turned to Edythe, one last time.

"You need to make a decision about whether you want to ignore me, or keep stringing me along with your cryptic words, I'm not going to keep losing sleep over a pretty girl," I snapped at her, grabbing my books and rushing out of my chair and to the door, only for my dramatic exit to be ruined as I tripped of the threshold, my books scattering everywhere. 

I closed my eyes; my face was heating up and I was annoyed at myself. 

When I opened them and looked down to retrieve my things, Edythe was already there, my books were in her hand and she was holding them out to me. 

I grabbed them, "Thanks," I said as I began to walk away.

I heard her quite voice, saying you're welcome, but I didn't look back as I rushed off to History. The rest of the day passed quickly, and I was grateful when I was out of art class, nearly running to my truck, which had survived the accident with minor scrapes and dents. I was surprised, when I reached it, to see Eric leaning there. Blocking my door.

Great, another one. 

"Hey, Eric. . ." I greeted warily. 

"Hi, Bella," he grinned. 

"Was there something you wanted?" I asked, as he moved away from my door to leave me space to open it. 

"Do you want to go to the dance with me?" he rushed out.

"No, I'm gay, be sure to tell anyone else planning to ask me," I told him, as I got in my truck, and inserted the keys into the ignition. 

His face was neutral, composed, "Oh that's cool, you know I have a gay cousin,"

"I am the gay cousin," I laughed, starting my car. 

"I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable," he said sincerely.

I smiled at him, "Thank you for that Eric, you know, you should ask Angela, I know she really wants to go with you.." I hinted. 

"Angela? Huh." His face was thoughtful, "Thanks, Bella,"

I waved as he left, hearing a low laugh and seeing Edythe walking past the front of my car. Her face was composed, not betraying her. But I knew her laugh. And I was pissed at myself for all the things I knew so well about her. 

I scowled, slamming my door shut and reversing out into the aisle.

Edythe was in her car already, two spaces down, she slid off into the lane, cutting me off. Then, she stopped. Waiting for her family who I looked around for, to see how long she was going to keep me here. The rest of her siblings walked slowly from the cafeterias exit, and I groaned. Looking in my rearview, I could see the line of cars start to grow, starting with Taylor's new, but used, Sentra. She waved at me as she got out of the car and I looked away. Honking my horn once, I needed to get out of here. 

I could see Edythe's eyes from her own rearview mirror, she was looking at me and I was glaring at her. A knock on my passenger side made me jump, I looked, and I almost groaned at the sight of Taylor. What now? I leaned across and attempted to roll the groaning window down, it stopped halfway.

"Sorry, Taylor, I can't move, but go tell Edythe to move," I said, leaning back into my seat.

"Oh, I just wanted to ask you something. . . You know, while we're stuck here," she grinned.

Was I dreaming? Had today been a weird vivid dream? What the fuck was going on?

"Will you go to the dance with me?" She continued.

"I—What?" 

"I don't know if you like girls or anything, but if you don't that's cool we can go as friends?" She continued smiling at me.

"I do, but I can't go with you. I'm not going to be in town that weekend, I'm going to Seattle." Or I guess, I was now.

Her smile fell, then picked right back up, "Oh, that's okay, there's always prom, right?"

She didn't give me a chance to respond before she was running off back to her car. And I just stared off into the place she had been in. What the fuck was going on with people in this school? This had to be some sort of collective joke. 

I looked ahead, Rosalie, Emmett, Archie and Jasper were all sliding into the Porsche. In the rearview mirror, Edythe's eyes were crinkled, still looking at me as her shoulders shook with laughter. I glared, revving my engine, thinking about making it scrap metal and seeing how Edythe would escape that accident. But she was already speeding away and I was sure she had heard my whole conversation with Taylor. 

I tried to keep my mind off of Edythe as I drove home. Like, was Taylor serious about prom? How was I going to get out of that one? I really didn't want to go. Maybe I should just move to the middle of nowhere and live off the land by myself and my multiple animals? That wasn't very realistic, mom would really hate that. Mom! Maybe I could go visit her to escape prom. Yeah, that's the one. 

When I got home, I went straight to the kitchen to cook. I was trying to find something to make that would keep me busy, keep my mind occupied. But I didn't have the energy, so I settled on making fried fish with rice. 

As I was seasoning the fish, my mind drifted off to Edythe. Today, she gave me more evidence that pointed to her being out of the ordinary. I started trying to connect the dots in my head, hoping to figure it out. I didn't know what I was going to do if I actually did figure it out. But I just focused on the facts.

Fact # 1: Edythe Cullen was impossibly beautiful.

Fact # 2: Edythe's eyes changed colors. It was a cycle, dark to golden, golden to dark.

Fact # 3: Edythe Cullen was impossibly fast.

Fact # 4: and strong.

Fact # 5: Edythe Cullen had unusually good hearing. 

That's what I knew so far about Edythe Cullen. She said it was better if we weren't friend, which didn't make sense to me. Not unless there was a part of her that couldn't allow a friendship to form between us, a part that was potentially dangerous. She reminded me of a legend my grandmother used to tell me. A legend whose details escaped me. 

When dad got home, I informed him that I would be going to Seattle a week from Saturday, he asked a few questions and shared some concerns about my truck but settled when I took his worries away. 

It was when he was putting away the dishes after diner that I thought to ask him about the legend. 

"Dad? Do you remember that legend abuela used to tell?" I knew grandma was a sensitive subject with him, he had been devasted when she passed.

He chuckled, "Which one?"

"I don't remember, but I think it was about some angels who walked the night or something," I tried to jog his memory and my own.

"oh yeah, Los Angeles De La Noche. That was a good one, I don't remember much of it, just that she once saw a man and a woman, walking in the dead of night. They were beautiful, with perfectly pale skin, and red eyes. She said, she saw them drinking the blood of her neighbor," he told me. 

"So, vampires?" I asked.

"She called them angels, that neighbor was a suspected serial killer, he never got caught, there wasn't enough evidence, so she thought God had been the one to send them. To get real justice," he corrected. 

Interesting.

Edythe being an angel was believable, Edythe being an angel who also went to high school was not. But, regardless, that was just a story told by my grandmother. And Edythe's eyes weren't red anyway. 

I went to bed, I wanted to shut my brain off, so I took some Nyquil and knocked out. Dreaming of a red eyed Edythe. 

The next morning at school, I was running late.

I parked far away from the Porche. She wasn't going to pin me in again. 

As I slammed the truck door shut, I lost my hold on my keys and watched at they fell into a puddle of dirty water. I bent to pick them up, but a pale hand flashed out and grabbed it before me. I whipped back up, almost hitting my head on hers. 

Edythe stood there, offering my keys with a cute, dimpled smile. 

"Where the fuck—how do you do that?" I gasped out.

She cocked her head, "do what?"

I reached out for my keys and she dropped them in my palm, "Appear out of thin air," 

"Bella, it's not my fault you are exceptionally unobservant," she murmured, her voice was soft, and she held back a smile.

How did she expect me to ignore her when she wouldn't leave me alone? Not that I wanted her to leave me alone, I was somehow hooked on this weird, possibly supernatural, girl. And I didn't even know how it happened. I thought she didn't want to be friends and yet, here she was, acting friendly, making jokes. Was she a sadist? It made sense since I was clearly a masochist for her.

I stared at her, frustrated. Her eyes were light again today, a deep, beautiful, honey color. I wanted to drink them in but instead, I looked away, before I actually got lost in them, and began walking.

"what was with the traffic jam yesterday? I thought you were pretending I didn't exist," I asked.

"Ah. That was more for Taylor's sake. She was figuratively dying for her chance with you,"

I blinked, furrowing my eyebrows, "how do you even know that?"

But she ignored me, "And I'm not pretending you don't exist,"

"No, just constantly giving me whiplash with your mood swings," I murmured, "What do you want, Edythe?" 

"Nothing," she quickly said, like she was lying.

I eyed her, "Okay, then," 

"Wait," she said. 

"Why won't you leave me alone?" but also, please don't.

"I wanted to ask you something, but you sidetracked me," 

"okay, what is it?" 

"I was wondering, if a week from Saturday—you know the day of the spring dance—"

I stopped dead on my feet looking at her as if she'd just slapped me across to the face, because to me, in a way, she did.

"I'm sorry, but is this funny to you?" what was she doing? Toying around with my emotions like this.

She stopped a foot away from me, turning around with an amused expression on her face. He hair was wet from the light drizzle that fell on us, and her face was smooth, perfect, her dimples exposed to the world making my heart cry. Why did she have to be so beautiful? Why did I have to like girls who were out of my league, or scary, or straight? 

"Will you please allow me to finish?" she asked, eyebrow raise.

Just walk away, Bella, you know it's what's best for you, I told myself.

But I didn't move. 

It was too late to walk away.

"I heard that you were going to Seattle that day, and I wondered if you wanted a ride," 

Wait, what? "Huh?"

"Do you want a ride to Seattle?" 

What did she mean? "With who?"

"Myself, obviously," she enunciated every syllable, like I didn't understand English.

I just didn't understand her, or what was going on here. 

"Why?" I was beginning to get scared.

How do I handle a pretty girl asking to take me on a three-hour ride to the city? How was I supposed to do that? Was she asking me out? Is this a date? What is going on? I'm confused. Where was the punchline to this joke?

"Well, I was planning to go to Seattle in the next few weeks, and to be honest, I'm not sure I your truck could make it." 

That insult was enough to get me moving away from her.

"make fun of me all you want but do me a favor and leave my truck out of it," I told her.

She laughed, having no trouble catching up to me, "Why would you think I'm making fun of you? My invitation is genuine."

"My truck could kick your cars ass," I huffed.

"Maybe so, but can your truck make it there in one tank of gas?" 

"Is that your problem?"

"The wasting of finite resources is everyone's problem," 

"Okay, Edythe, what's the deal? I thought you didn't want to be friends?" 

"I said it would be better if we weren't friends, not that I didn't want to be," she smiled. 

"Great, thank god that's been cleared up," I said, my voice thick with sarcasm, and I stopped walking again.

"it would be more. . . prudent for you not to be my friend," she explained. "but I'm tired of staying away from you, Bella,"

Wait, was that gay? I couldn't remember how to breath, let alone talk. All I knew to do was just keep looking at her and wait for the other shoe to drop. Because, there was just no way this was happening right?

"So, will you accept a ride with me to Seattle?" she asked, her eyes wide, long lashes framed them, and I was lost again the pools of honey.

I stilled didn't remember how to speak, so I just nodded. 

She smiled, before turning serious again, "You should really stay away from me," she warned, as she spun on her heels and walked off, "see you in class," she called back and all I could do was look at her retreating back.

So, was that gay or not?


	5. Blood Type

I walked to English in a daze, I hadn't even noticed I missed Gym until I got there, and it was empty. I hadn't realized I was that late, or that Edythe distracted me enough not to notice. 

When I walked in to the English classroom, I interrupted Mr. Mason. 

Whose irritated voice said, "Thank you for joining us, Miss Swan,"

In my still confused state, I had told him, "You're welcome," earning a laugh from my peers and a glare from Mr. Mason. Who now probably hated me.

And it wasn't until class had finished that I noticed Mike wasn't sitting in his usual seat next to me. I guess he didn't take the news very well, but I didn't care. I was surprised when him and Eric waiting for me by the door. As we walked to Trig, Mike became more himself. He was enthusiastic—and optimistic—about the weather report for the weekend. The rain was supposed to stop, and the sun was supposed to show it's face for what seemed like years to me, it would be, according to Mike, the perfect weather to head to the beach. It sounded too good to be true, even if there was no rain, chances are it would be still too cold. Not my idea of a beach day, but okay.

The rest of the morning passed by in a blur, Edythe was disturbing my perception of time and reality. I think had trouble believing our conversation this morning, and I was positive that this was some sort of elaborate prank. But, as the self-proclaimed masochist that I was, I would take it. I knew for sure this wasn't some sort of delusion, this was really happening. I actually may be appealing to the weird girl with the pretty dimples. And if I was going to do this, if I was going to put myself out there for her, I was going to have to do it with not two but three eyes open. Edythe still had a secret that she wasn't telling me, one that I was sure is dangerous. And no matter how much I liked her dimples, or how much I lost control of my body and mind whenever I was anywhere near her, I was going to have to be careful. 

I walked into the cafeteria nervously with Jessica by my side, most of my attention was fixed on Edythe. But I caught on to the subject she was rambling about today. Mike asked her to the dance, and they were going with a group. Eric and Angela, and a kid named Logan and Taylor. The last name made me shudder. Surprisingly, the car accident didn't give me PTSD, Taylor did. 

As we waited in line to get our food, I looked over at the Cullen's table. Disappointment hit me when I saw only four people sitting there. And Edythe wasn't one of them. Why did she keep disappearing every time we made progress?

I grabbed a bottle of coke and moved through the line. I was sad, and mad that she made me feel that way. 

"Edythe Cullen is staring at you again," Jessica whispered, this was the thing that made me pay attention to Jessica. "I wonder why she's sitting all alone today," 

My head snapped up and I followed her line of sight. Edythe was there, sitting in an empty cafeteria table across from where she usually sat. Once she saw me looking, her dimples made an appearance and she raised her index finger to motion me over. And I looked at her through my bewilderment, she winked. At me. 

"Does she mean you?" Jessica questioned. 

"Maybe she needs help with biology homework, see you later," I muttered, ignoring the astonishment in her voice as I moved forward through the cafeteria, feeling Jessica's eyes burning on my back. 

I tried to calm my breath before I approached, but maybe she shouldn't be allowed to fucking wink anymore. As I got to the table, I stood awkwardly behind the empty chair across from her.

"would you like to sit with me today?" she asked through a wide smile. 

Oh, she's bad for my cardiac health. 

I sat down, looking at her, while she looked at me through a wide smile. Was I supposed to talk? 

"this is different," I stated, not knowing what to say or do. 

"Well," she began, "I decided as long as I was going to hell, I might as well do it thoroughly," 

Oh, so she was a demon. A succubus! That's going on the list of things Edythe Cullen might be, right at the top. 

I acted oblivious, "You do know I don't know what that means, right?"

"I'm counting on it," she said, before her eyes focused behind me, "I think your friends are upset that I've stolen you away," 

I suddenly could feel all of their eyes behind my back, but I didn't care. 

"They'll be okay,"

She grinned, leaning in to say, "I may not give you back, though,"

"Please, don't," keep me, lock me away, throw away the key.

So much for three eyes open.

She leaned back, "Are you worried?"

"No," I swallowed, my voice breaking a bit. "Surprised, actually. What's all this about?" I asked, gesturing toward her and the table. 

"I told you—I'm tired of trying to stay away from you. So, I'm giving up." She seriously said. 

"Giving up?" I repeated, my eye brow raising.

"Yes—giving up trying to be good. I'm just going to do what I want now and let the chips fall where they may." There was a hard edge to her silky voice. 

"I'm lost," 

She chuckled lightly, "I always say too much when I'm talking to you—that's one of the problems." 

I didn't think that was true, but to ensure she kept accidentally dropping hints, I said, "Don't worry about it, I don't understand anything you say," 

"Like I said—I'm counting on that,"

We looked at each other silently, the silence wasn't awkward, it was more... charged. And I felt my face heating up.

"So," I broke the silence, looking away to catch the breath that I'd lost, "In plain English, are we friends now?" 

"Friends..." she murmured, like the word was unfamiliar to her.

"Or not?"

"Well. We can try, I suppose. But I'm warning you again that I'm not a good friend for you to have," her smile was wicked, the warning real.

"You say that a lot," my stomach was swirling, and I'm pretty sure she wasn't going to run away again. She actually meant what she was saying. Or she believed it anyway. I didn't want to get my hopes up, but that was always damn near impossible when it came to Edythe. 

"I do, because you're not listening. I'm still waiting for you to hear me. If you're smart, you'll avoid me," 

"Well, I've never been smart when it came to pretty girls," I said, shocking myself at my lack of filter.

She smiled widely again, and I wondered what she was thinking. Did she like me? In more than a friend kind of way or was I in for a world of hurt later. Honestly, at this point it didn't even matter. I just wanted to be close to her, not just to uncover the truth of what she really was, but because the feeling she made me feel all over my body was starting to grow on me. I was becoming addicted to her.

"What are you thinking?" she asked, eyes full of kitten-like curiosity. 

I looked again, as I lied, "I'm wondering what you are,"

Her teeth clenched around her smile, "are you having much luck with that?" she asked, her voice casual, as if she didn't care about the answer.

My face got hot. I've given way too much thought to it. From the angel in my grandmother's story, to the succubus theory I had acquired just now. I even started looking for valid theories in comic books. Alien from another world like Clack Kent? Bitten by a weird spider like Peter Parker, maybe an outcast from Themyscira, possibly related to Diana Prince. 

She tilted her head and looked right in my eyes, well, she actually seemed to be trying to look past them. Right into my thoughts and for a second, I thought she actually might be able to read them.

Then she smiled—inviting this time, impossible to resist. 

"Won't you tell me?" 

But I had to resist. She couldn't know what I was thinking. I shook my head no, not trusting my own voice.

"That's really frustrating." She complained, frowning.

"Really?" I raised my eyebrow, finding my voice again, "Like... someone refusing to tell you what she's thinking, even is all the while she's making cryptic little comments designed to keep you up at night wondering what she could possibly mean... Frustrating like that?"

"You're not over that yet?" her frown turned into a scowl.

"Not quite," 

"Would another apology help?" 

"I think I'm past being apologized to, though I wouldn't turn down an explanation,"

She pursed her lips, then glanced over my shoulder and laughed once.

"What?"

"Your boyfriend thinks I'm being mean to you—he's debating whether or not to come break up our fight," 

How does she even know that? "Please, don't ever refer to him as my boyfriend," I shuddered. "And stop trying to change the subject,"

"You might not think of him that way, but that's how he thinks of you," she ignored my second half of my statement.

"There's no way that's true," 

"It is, I told you, most people are easy to read," 

"Except me,"

"Yes, except for you." Her eyes shifted, looking past mine again and intensified. "I wonder why that is,"

This is another clue, my brain told me. She knew something about Mike, something that she heard. But he was all the way across the cafeteria. I know she has good hearing, but was it really that good? It was loud in here, voices drowned each other out. 

I looked away, remembering the coke bottle in front of me. I unscrewed it and took a drink, looking at the table. Her eyes were too intense, I needed a minute. 

"Aren't you hungry?" she asked.

When I looked up, the intense look in her eyes had disappeared and I felt relief. "No. You?"

"No, I'm not hungry," she laughed, something in her eyes made me think I was missing some sort of joke.

"Can you do me a favor?" I asked.

She got serious quickly, "It depends on what you want," 

"It's not much,"

She waited; her posture was guarded but she was still serious.

"Can I have a warning next time you want to start ignoring me again? So, I can prepare myself?" I looked down at my bottle cap, tracing the lid, as I talked.

"That sounds fair,"

I glanced up, she looked like she was suppressing a laugh and I wondered what was funny about my request. Or about me in general.

"Can I have a favor in return?" she asked, leaning in.

I leaned back, trying to escape her influence on me, "Sure," I agreed.

"Tell me one of your theories."

Fuck, "No way," I shook my head.

"You promised me a favor," she frowned, her lips forming a pout, I tried not to stare. 

"That means nothing to me, you've broken promises to me before," I reminded her.

"Just one theory, I promise not to laugh,"

"Yeah, you will," I had no doubt about that, I couldn't present to her my more serious theories, I was left with the comic book plagiarism I would be committing if I told her.

She looked down, before glancing up at me with her impossibly long lashes, her golden eyes capturing me. 

"Please?" she breathed, leaning toward me. I knew I was fucked when my body worked without permission and leaned in toward her. Like she was a magnet and I was the paperclip. With her face less than a foot away from mine, I noticed the freckles the lightly kissed her face for the first time. 

I shook my head, trying to get out of the trance and I forced myself to sit back, I needed to be kept far away from her. "Um, what?"

"One little theory," it was like she was purring, oh my god. "Please?"

"Uh, oh well, uh, bitten by radioactive spiders," I was thankful to the little part of my brain that worked fast to keep my good theories to myself. If I was anywhere near the right answer, she would for sure run away. I didn't want that.

She rolled her eyes, "That's not very creative, I'm disappointed."

"Sorry, that's all I've got," I shrugged.

"You're not even close,"

"No spiders?"

"No spiders,"

"No radioactivity?"

"None at all,"

"Damn," I mumbled.

She chuckled, "Kryptonite doesn't bother me, either,"

I frowned, "You're not supposed to laugh."

She pursed her lips, trying to hold the laughter back but her shaking shoulders gave her away and I rolled my eyes.

"I'll figure it out eventually,"

And like a light switch, she was serious again, "I really wish you wouldn't try,"

"It's not possible for me not to wonder, I mean, you're... impossible," I didn't mean it as a criticism, just a statement, you're more than what is possible, you shouldn't exist, legends are told about people like you. Books are written about women like you. 

Edythe understood me, "What if I'm not the hero, what if I'm the villain,"

"Oh, okay," this was another hint.

"What does okay mean exactly?" she questioned quietly.

I didn't know myself, so I tried to collect my thoughts. Her face was anxious, waiting for my answer. 

"You're... dangerous?" it came out like a question, I was still thinking about it as I looked at her. She didn't seem dangerous. I compare her to a kitten a lot, with her wide curious eyes and the cute head tilt she always did. She was... soft looking. Someone you would want to protect, not someone who you needed protection from. Of course, I knew better than to judge a book by it's cover. Jessica was an example of a misleading cover, she was smart, her grades told me that much. And she didn't look ignorant, but the words that came out of her mouth were. So, could Edythe be dangerous? Yeah, I believed she could if she wanted to, the murderous look in her eyes that first day in biology was evidence of that. But she definitely was no villain, her actions spoke out against it. 

"Dangerous..." I said slowly, her wide eyes were anxiously waiting my reaction. She seemed to be bracing herself for it, "but not the villain," I whispered, "I don't believe that."

She looked down, "You're wrong," she barely whispered, stealing my bottle cap, spinning it between her fingers.

She meant that. She meant what she was saying, she wanted me to be afraid of her. But I was more intrigued, curious. 

And most of all, I was fascinated by her. My nerves, nerves of my closeness to her in this moment, were almost enough to drown out that fascination. Almost. But not quite, because all I wanted to do right not, at this point in time, was sit and watch her face and the expressions that made her face so appealing to me. I wanted to analyze her moments, get to know her. Find out if she felt the same way I did about her. Did she get nervous around me? Did she have breathing problems when I was around? Did her heart stop and start when I looked at her? So of course, just as I was building the courage to ask, I noticed the cafeteria was nearly empty.

I almost bolted out of my seat at the realization that I had responsibilities. She looked up at me, she seemed sad, like this was the reaction she was waiting for.

"We're going to be late," I told her, grabbing my bag. 

Her look of sadness switched to a look of surprise, then she laughed. Her amusement was back, and she leaned back. The bottle cap she was twirling was just a blur around her fingers.

"I'm not going to class today,"

I frowned, disappointed, "Why not?"

She smiled up at me, but her eyes gave her anxiety away, "It's healthy to ditch every now and then,"

"Oh. Well I guess I should go?" I never liked to ditch important classes, but if she asked me to, I would.

Her attention was back on the bottle cap, "See you later then,"

That sounded like a dismissal, and I frowned. Walking away with a quite bye. I was thankful to have some time away from her. The father I got, the more my brain started to work again. The more my breathing and heart beat normalized, and I was able to function again by the time I exited the cafeteria. Though, none of my questions were answered, I got more clues to the mystery of Edythe Cullen. 

I rushed to class; I knew that I was late. But when I walked in, luck found me. Mr. Banner had yet to arrive. And I was thankful not to have another repeat of this morning. I walked to my seat quietly, Angela and Mike looked at me the whole way to my seat. Angela had almost a smirk on her face, Mike seemed... sad. 

I sat down just as Mr. Banner walked in, calling the class to order while juggling some cardboard boxes around, which he let go off on Mike's table, asking him to start passing them around.

"Okay, guys, I want each of you to take one piece from each box," he took out a pair of rubber gloves from his lab coat, as he continued his directions, he slipped them on. "The first should be an indicator card." he grabbed a white card and displayed it to us. "The second is a four-pronged applicator," he held the tool up, "And the third is a sterile micro-lancet." he displayed a small piece of blue plastic before splitting it open. The barb was invisible from this distance, but my stomach dropped, anyway.

"I'll be coming around with a dropper of water to prepare your cards, so please don't start until I get to you," he began at Mike's table again, carefully putting one drop of water in each of the four squares of the white card. 

"Then I want you to carefully prick your finger with the lancet," he grabbed Mike's hand and jabbed the spike into the tip of Mike's middle finger. 

"Ow," Mike complained quietly.

I was not prepared; clammy moisture broke across my forehead and my ears began faintly ringing.

"Put a small drop of blood on each of the prongs... " Mr. Banner demonstrated as he instructed, squeezing Mike's finger until the blood flowed. I gulped, my stomach beginning to heave. 

"And then apply it to the card," he finished, holding up the dripping red card for is to see. 

I closed my eyes, trying to ignore my ringing ears, and reopened them.

"The Red Cross is having a blood drive in Port Angeles next week and I thought you should all know your blood type." he sounded proud of himself. "Those of you who aren't eighteen yet will need a parent's permission, I have the slips at my desk."

He continued through the room with his water dropper. I put my cheek against the cool, black table top and tried to hold on as everything seemed to get farther and farther away. When Taylor had been wheeled in all bloody at the ER that day, I was mentally prepared to see blood, and smell it. But Mr. Banner had caught me by surprised. I was sliding down a dark tunnel. The noises my classmate were making seemed to be getting farther and farther away. 

I breathed slowly in and out through my mouth.

"Bella? Are you all right?" Mr. Banner's voice was distant, but alarmed.

"I already know my blood type, sir. I'm O negative." I said from my place of the table, I couldn't open my eyes. 

"Are you feeling faint?" 

"Yes," I murmured; I should've stayed with Edythe.

"Can someone pleas take Bella to the nurse?" he called.

"I will," I recognized Mike's voice.

"Can you walk?" Mr. Banner asked.

"Yes," my voice cracked.

I felt Mike grab my hand, I didn't care that it was most likely all sweating and disgusting, I let him wrap an arm around my waist and carried most of my weight out of the classroom, and then through the hallways until we were finally outside. All the while I fought back against the dark spots in my vision, once we were outside. I stopped, Mike looked at me with a worried expression when I asked him to help me down on the sidewalk.

"I just need a minute," I said from the ground and closed my eyes, focusing on my breathing and laying back on the cold sidewalk. I really should've ditched with Edythe. "And keep you hand in your pocket,"

"Bella you're green!" Mike said with a nervous edge. 

"Just a second," I breathed out.

"Bella?" said a new voice, oh god. Why me?

"What's wrong? Is she hurt?" she asked and I groaned, her voice was closer and I began to pray that I wouldn't throw up in front of her. 

Mike sounded stressed when he answered, "I think she fainted! She didn't even prick her finger, I don't get it!" 

This time her voiced was by my head, "Bella, are you okay? Can you hear me?"

"No, go away," I shakily said as I put my arms over my eyes, hoping to disappear.

She laughed.

"I was taking her to the nurse but she wouldn't go any farther,"

"I'll take her, you should head back to class."

"But I'm supposed to. . ."

Suddenly, two strong, cold arms appeared under mine and suddenly I was back on my feet instantly, and my eyes snapped back open in shock. All I saw was her red mess of curls near my face before I felt her arm wrap around my waist and she began to move us forward, I stumbled cursing the higher power responsible for getting me into these situations around Edythe. Mike was forgotten about and Edythe was literally carrying my weight across the small campus.

"You faint at the sight of blood?" She chuckled.

"Please don't judge me or my weak vasovagal system." I croaked out.

She laughed harder this time, "You should get that checked out,"

We had reached the nurses office, and somehow, she managed to open the door while also keeping me upright. It was warm when we got inside, except where her body touched mine. Under any normal circumstance I would be enjoying being this close to Edythe. Her body touching mine was something I fantasized about.

"Oh, my," A woman's voice gasp, she sat behind a desk her feet were propped up on it until she looked up from her magazine and saw me.

"She's having a neutrally mediated syncope," explained Edythe, both mine and the nurses eyes widened, she had already reached us.

The nurse gasped, "Should I call nine-one-one?"

"It's just a fainting spell," Edythe replied, trying not to laugh.

Both Edythe and Mrs. Cope helped me into a room with medical supplies and a cot, laying me down. 

"What happened?" Mrs. Cope asked.

"They're blood typing in Biology," I heard Edythe answer for me, I was too busy focusing on my breathing with my eyes closed, the dizziness I let was beginning to subside and I could hear clearer now.

"There's always one, just hang in there, it'll pass. I'll go get you an ice pack," her voice faded as she left the room.

I opened my eyes and looked around, Edythe was leaned against the counter on the opposite side of the room, she was already looking at me when my eyes found hers.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

I nodded as I sat up and Mrs. Cope returned, handing me the ice pack before leaving me again, "Never better,"

"Strange situations you get yourself into, Bella," she chuckled.

"Strange you're always there to help me. You were right, by the way," I laughed lightly, pressing the ice pack to my temple.

"Hmm, I usually am but what about this time?" she cocked her head to the side.

"Ditching is healthy," I shook my head. 

She let out a small laugh, pausing before she admitted; "You scared me, I thought Mike had slipped you something and I was going to have to avenge your death,"

I put down the ice pack, feeling better already, "How did you even see us? I thought you left?" 

She shook her head, "I was in my car listening to music,"

Mrs. Cope stuck her head in, "We have another one," She warned and I jumped of the bed to make room for the next patient. 

Just then, Mike came in bringing along a girl from our class whose name I never learned. Edythe was at my side, holding my elbow as we moved aside for the girl to lay down.

"Oh no," Edythe said, "Bella you should get out of here now,"

"Why?" But before she could answer the smell hit me and I was out of the room in a second, with each step I took I could feel her right behind me.

"You actually listened," she chuckled, steadying me as I stumbled a little.

"I smelled the blood," I shuddered.

"Impossible," she contradicted.

"No, really, it smells all salty and metallic, that's what makes me sick," 

She raised an eyebrow at me.

I looked around, "Um, what?"

"Nothing," 

Mike joined us just them, glancing at Edythe before looking at me, then back at her.

"Uh, thank you for your help with Bella, Edythe," he said, voice wavering.

"No worries," Edythe replied, an amused smile playing on her face.

"You're looking better," he said to me. "Are you headed back to class?"

I scoffed, "So I can faint again? No thank you,"

"Right, well are you coming to the beach this weekend?" 

"Um, I'm not sure," I didn't want to say no, if the weather was in fact nice like I was being told then I would definitely show up to enjoy the sun and blue skies.

"Well we're meeting at my parents store at ten, incase you make up your mind," he glanced at Edythe, his body language making it clear that this wasn't really an open invitation for her. "I'll see you in History," he nodded before leaving.

"Ugh, right more classes," I groaned, walking through the doors, shivering at the cold air I found outside.

I walked aimlessly and found myself in the middle of the student parking lot, "I'm going home," I decided.

"I can drive you," Edythe said from a step behind me. 

I stopped and turned, "That's okay, I can drive,"

"It would be irresponsible of me to let you drive in your condition." She stated.

"What condition? I'm fine." I crossed my arms challenging, "and besides, what about my truck?"

She shrugged, "I'll have Archie drop it off after school,"

"No thanks," I moved toward my parking spot only to be stopped by her small hand grabbing at the back of my jacket, making me stumble.

"Bella, friends don't let friends drive with weak vasovagal systems," she amusement danced in her eyes, "My cars this way," she let go of me and turned, walking in the opposite direction from my truck.

I stood there; I knew the moment she offered me a ride I was going to somehow end up in the passenger seat of her ridiculously priced car. So why was I fighting having a few extra minutes to spend around Edythe? Well, for one thing I was stubborn, and for another, I couldn't really show her that I was weak for alone time with her. 

"If you don't follow, I'll just have to drag you to my car," she turned her face, she was already about ten spaces ahead of me. 

I huffed and gave up, walking to catch up with her as she reached her car, unlocking the doors and sliding in. I nervously opened the passenger seat and got inside. It smelled like her; the sweet smell of springtime wildflowers. I don't know how springtime wildflowers smell, but, that's the only thing that I could use to explain her smell. Which, might be creepy of me to even know how she smells. 

As she backed out and exited the schools parking lot, I tried my best to start a conversation, "So, are you going to the beach this weekend?"

"Which beach?" I noticed her hand gripping the steering wheel.

"Um, First Beach, down at La Push," I replied. 

She looked deep in thought as she answered, taking a moment to look at me as she answered, "I don't think I was invited."

"I'm inviting you," I rolled my eyes.

"Lets not me and you push poor Mike too far, he might have a heart attack," She laughed.

"Who cares about Mike? Besides he knows I like girls, he absolutely has no chance. Like, at all." 

She came to a stop at one of the three red lights in town and looked at me, "He's having a hard time believing that, actually, he thinks he can change your sexuality for him," 

I was confused, "And how exactly do you know this?" 

"Just a feeling," she shrugged.

We were quite after, I looked at her through narrowed eyes as I tried to decipher her. She shouldn't know these things about Mike, somehow, I believed her. But how exactly did she know this when she and her family alienate themselves from the whole student body. The silence must've bothered her, because she moved to turn on the cars radio and a sweet melody played around us.

"Is that Clair De Lune?" I asked.

She turned and looked at me with wide eyes, "You know Debussy?" 

"Not really, my mom plays classical music anytime she's redecorating the house, I only know my favorites,"

"Its one of my favorites too," she smiled, her eyes meeting mine as she came to a stop and put the car in park.

Just then I noticed we were at my house, though my eyes could barely make the shape of it out as a heavy rain had just settled in. 

"Bella?" she asked, "What's your mom like?" 

Her golden eyes looked into mine curiously.

"Hm, she's different. Not very responsible, very impulsive and eccentric. Like a kid. She loves to experiment in the kitchen, and it never turns out too great. She looks like me, same eyes but she's white, so people who meet us have a hard time believing we're mother and daughter, " I rolled my eyes, thinking of the neighbor who called my mom a saint for adopting me at such a young age. 

"Do you approve of Phil?" she asked, I was surprised that she actually remembered his name, but answered nonetheless.

"At first, I didn't, he's very young and his job isn't really reliable. But he makes her happy and that's all I want for my mom," I answered honestly.

"That's very mature of you... Hm, I wonder, would your mom would extend that same curtesy to you, no matter who you choose?" her eyes were more intense now, and boring right into mine. 

I stuttered, "oh, I—I think so,"

"Do I scare you?" Her question caught me off guard.

I looked her over before I could answer, she didn't look scary, but I know looks can be deceiving. But did she scare me? 

"No, you don't," I said, carefully as I searched her face for a reaction. 

She looked away disappointed, turning her face to the window, like she was deep in thought.

"But I'm sure you can be scary." I tried to make her feel better, I didn't even know why she wanted to be seen as scary by me.

She looked back at me frowning, like she disapproved of my previous answer and my attempt to reassure her, but she didn't say anything else, so I took it as an opportunity to ask my own questions. 

"What about your family?" I asked.

She smiled slightly, "what about them?"

"Well, your moms, how long have you been with them?" I asked.

"It feels like forever, honestly, I can barely remember my birthparents. Carine and Esme have always been my mothers." She smiled with love. "I got lucky, I suppose,"

I smiled back, admiring her, "What happened to your birthparents, if you don't mind me asking,"

She sighed, "They died a long time ago," 

She didn't seem to be suffering that loss anymore, "and your siblings?"

"My siblings, especially Jasper and Rosalie are going to be very angry if I make them wait out in the rain for me," she smiled at me.

"Oh right, we wouldn't want to get Rosalie's hair wet," I chuckled.

"That wouldn't be good for anyone in this town," she laughed, flashing those dimples.

"Thank you for the unnecessary ride," I smiled, moving to leave the car.

She grabbed my wrist, stopping me, "Have fun at the beach this weekend, and please try not to attract anymore accidents,"

I rolled my eyes, nodding, "Won't I see you tomorrow?"

She shook her head, letting go of me, "No, Emmett and I will be starting the weekend early, we'll be going hiking The Goat Rocks Wilderness," she informed before I could ask.

My eyebrows pulled together, "Fun..."

She smiled her dimpled smile and I croaked out a goodbye before jumping into the downpour outside, running straight for the porch, proud of myself when I made it in one piece. The Porche was gone when I turned around and I remembered I hadn't given her my keys, but when I looked into the pocket of my jacket, I came up empty handed. 

"Oh,"


	6. Scary Stories

My truck appeared out of thin air that night. One second I was trying to listen for it while also trying to focus on my English homework and when I looked out the window for the second time in thirty minutes, it was suddenly sitting in my driveway. The next morning the keys were in the ignition. And I tried to rack my brain to try and pinpoint exactly when did Edythe pick pocket me, the only time she was close enough was when she basically carried me to the nurses office and when she grabbed my jacket to stop me from driving.

I shook my head, focusing on the drive to school, which didn't take long enough. When I got there, I remembered Edythe wasn't going to be in school today and I actually got sad. I wanted to slap myself for feeling that way, but was there anything I could do? I didn't think so I was in way to deep. At lunch, I couldn't get away from the fainting comments. Jessica got a kick out of laughing about it with a girl named Lauren and I started to wonder why I didn't just stay home. 

Jessica also had questions about my lunch with Edythe yesterday.

"So, what did Cullen want yesterday?" she had asked on our way to biology.

"Nothing," I replied, it wasn't really any of her business.

She frowned, "She looked kinda mad, it was weird to see her without her family."

"Yeah, weird." 

She frowned harder this time, annoyed that I didn't give her juicier answers. 

When we walked into the Biology classroom my mood went further down at the reminder that she really wasn't here today. I knew I was feeling this way because I had a embarrassingly huge crush on this extraordinary girl, but that wasn't something I wanted to admit to myself. Instead I tried to convince myself that I was only disappointed because I wouldn't get more clues as to what exactly she was, but truly at this point, I didn't really give a fuck anymore. I just wanted to be around her, talk to her, get to know Edythe the person rather than Edythe the mystery. 

Before I left school, Mike reminded me to meet at his parent's store before we headed to the beach and I confirmed my decision to go. Hopefully the weatherman wasn't wrong, and the weather would be nice. My dad was excited for my trip when I told him at diner, and he approved of most of the people going, though I only knew the names of a few of them. 

The sun greeted me in the morning, and it felt like I hadn't seen it in years, I was happy to see it shining through my curtains and I got ready for the beach quickly before pouring myself some cereal downstairs. I ate it quickly, knowing I had about twenty minutes before everyone was set to leave from Newton Sporting Goods.

On the drive there I thought about my conversation with my dad the previous night.

"Dad? Do you know some place called Goat Rocks Wilderness?" I had asked, while a commercial interrupted his game. 

"Sure, its just south of Rainer, why?" he replied curiously.

I shrugged, "Just curious, some people at school were planning a camping trip down there,"

He furrowed his eyebrows, confused, ","

It was weird that Edythe and Emmett would choose such a place to hike. Given that it wasn't known for that kind of thing and bears roamed the area. And it made me question more about the Edythe and her strange family. 

I got to the Newton store quickly, parking next to Mike's van. Questions still plagued my brain but I pushed them down, there was no point, I wasn't going to get answers today. So I hopped out my truck and greeted my friends. Angela was thankfully there, stood next to Jessica who was talking to Mike. A few other people I barely knew stood around their own groups.

"Hey, Bella. I told you it would be nice today, didn't I." Mike grinned at me, and I gave a small smile back as I joined them.

"I'm impressed, but I don't think it will be lasting long, we better get to the beach fast." I replied.

Jessica spoke then, "We're just waiting on Taylor and Logan, they should be here soon," 

"You guys are riding with me and Eric, you can have shotgun, Bella" Mike spoke, making Jessica frown.

I looked at Angela, who was looking at the situation in amusement, "Jessica, don't you get carsick in the back? Maybe you should ride shotgun." I lied.

Jessica smiled brightly, "yes, yeah I do, thanks, Bella."

When it was time to leave, I made sure I got a window seat next to Angela, she was still the only person I felt comfortable with. I took in the view as my friends chatted loudly amongst themselves laughing and singing along to the horrible music Mike had chosen to play. I liked it when forks look like this, not gray and gloomy, but blue green and sunny. Happy. I felt like it was the first time since I came here that I could properly breath. My chest was at ease as I took in the winding road that took us to La Push, smiled down at the coast as the dark blue waters glistened in the sun. We crossed two bridges and beneath them, the Quillayute river could be seen rushing by. 

I had been to the beaches in La Push plenty of times with Dad during my summer visits with him. They were beautiful and my favorite place to visit here, so when the mile-long crescent of First Beach came into view my brain exploded with memories. I never got in the water; I was always too paranoid. But I always appreciated the rocky shore where the stones were different colors and everyone of them seemed like an important gem. Driftwood could be seen every so often throughout the beach, white with salt. And pelicans moved through the skies and stood around the shore. In the distance, islands rose out of the water hauntingly. Their sheer and sharp like cliffs looked dangerous, and they probably were. 

When we excited the cars, the cool breeze kissed my face, playing with my wild hair as we made our way down to the beach. I tripped a few times as I sank into the sand and Angela was always there to catch me before I actually fell. I thanked her every time as she giggled at me, shaking her head at my clumsiness. Soon we stopped at a circle of driftwood logs that sat around a campfire. It had already been used before, so Mike led a hunt for wood with Erick and Logan. Soon there was enough wood to start a fire. 

I was surprised when a grill was brought out along by one of the guys that I think was named Austin. One of Mike's coolers I saw was filled with hotdogs and hamburger meat. I was impressed. I figured we would be eating at one of the many shops around here. 

I was even more surprised to see that Jacob had joined the party along with a few other people. I moved away from my conversation with Angela and Jessica over to greet him.

When he saw me, his face broke into a wide brilliant smile. 

"Hey, Bella!" he awkwardly hugged me.

"Hi, Jacob," I smiled. 

Lauren, who had been hanging around the new commers decided to speak, "Oh, looks like you've got yourself a date, Isabella, I guess you're not missing Cullen," 

I looked at her with a raised eyebrow, I knew the news of my sexuality was widely known by now, no one had actually dared to speak so directly about it to me. And I didn't like her tone, "Excuse you?" 

"I was just saying to Taylor how sad it was that no one invited the Cullen's," she laughed. 

I rolled my eyes, "And what does that have to do with me? Quit being a bitch and hop off,"

Jacob laughed and Lauren seemed to be thrown off, that looked like it wasn't going to stop her. But she was interrupted by a strong, demanding voice.

"Do you mean Dr. Carine Cullen's family?" she said, and everyone's eyes turned to her.

She was definitely older than anyone here, but not by much. She was a tall native woman; her long hair was in a braid. We all had to look up at her. She was clear a leader, someone you bowed down to.

"Yes, do you know them?" Lauren dared to take a rude tone with her. 

"The Cullen's don't come here," she simply said, her voice clear, then she turned away.

I looked after her as she began to head up the beach with two other native girls, all of their postures straight as the walked with confidence that demanded admiration. I was confused at her words; the Cullen's don't come here. The way she said it was like they weren't allowed to come here, and I wondered why. 

Jacob interrupted my thoughts, "So is Forks driving you nuts yet or what?" 

I wanted to laugh, I think I was beyond at this point, "You have no idea... Hey, do you wanna go for a walk?" 

I smiled at him, if there was anyone that could give me any information as to what that girl said, it would be Jacob. 

He blushed, "Yeah,"

At this point I was certain that Jacob had a crush on me, one that I hoped would go away, but also one that I could use to my advantage in order to get the information I need from him. No matter how fucked up that might be. So we began silently walking down the beach, in the opposite direction from that the girl and her friends went. At this point the sun was low in the sky and I got ready to say my final goodbyes to it. Who knows when I'll be seeing it again?

"Nice friends you got there," I commented.

"Samantha? She's not a friend. She's nineteen, so I don't really hang out with her, I was there with Quil, but she ditched me," 

"She was a bit weird, what did she even mean about the Cullen's?" I took a chance in asking.

He laughed, "Oh, I'm not really supposed to talk about that."

I nodded as I sat down on a large driftwood, he followed my lead, "Well, hey, I can keep a secret," I pushed him gently with my shoulder. 

That was my awkward attempt at flirting, "Well, I guess Sam kinda already gave it away..."

"So, we'll blame her," I laughed. 

"Cool, Sam's fault, got it. Okay, so do you like scary stories?" 

"Hm, only if they're actually scary," I replied.

He smiled, "So, they're actually the legends of our tribe. You see, the Quileute's are said to be descended from wolves, and are still our sisters. It's against tribal law to kill them. And so the Cullen's are supposedly descended from an enemy clan, or, the cold ones," His voice dropped to a whisper and he leaned in closer to me. I stayed quiet, letting him continue I was too interested to interrupt him. "There are stories about the cold ones that go back generations, some are more recent. The story goes that my great-grandmother found them hunting on our land, but they claimed to be something different, so she made a treaty with them. If they promised to stay off our land, then we wouldn't expose them to the pale faces," 

He stopped, looking at me, so I encouraged him, "So, are they dangerous?"

He shrugged, "Supposedly they weren't dangerous to humans like others of their kinds are, they were able to live off animals, so a deal was made because

I was a bit confused, "How does this fit into the Cullen's, though? Are they related to that clan?"

"No..." he shook his head, pausing dramatically, "they are the same ones," 

He grinned, and I tried to laugh, but this wasn't making any sense. How does this family come into town and somehow have a history with the Quileute tribe? This must've happened decades ago, and somehow, according to Jacob they are the same people, or whatever they were. My head was reeling. 

"There are more of them now," Jacob interrupted, "A two new males, but the rest are the same. In my great-grandmothers they already knew of their leader, Carine. She'd been her and gone before even before the colonists arrived."

"and what are they?" I finally asked, my heart pounding at the thought that I might actually get an answer. "What are the cold ones?"

"Blood drinkers," he replied in a chilling tone, "you may know them as vampires,"

I looked away into the ocean, I could hear Edythe's voice in my head clearly asking; do you think I could be scary?

"You have goosebumps," Jacob laughed, "Did I scare you?"

"you actually did," I took a breath, "you're good at that,"

He smiled, "Or you're just cold... Hm I guess I just violated the treaty,"

I smiled sincerely, "I'll take it to the grave, promise,"

"Yeah, if Charlie finds out he'll be mad at mom again, he was already pissed when she told him that some of us wouldn't be going to that hospital anymore because of Dr. Cullen. I hope you don't think we're a bunch of superstitious natives," his voice was worried.

I looked his in the eyes and said, "I would never,"

Jacob had to go, and so did I, we said our goodbyes, I promised to come visit again, and I headed back up the beach to find my friends wondering where I was. I told them I was wondering around the beach with an old friend and helped them pack and we headed back to the cars. 

The sky overhead had turned dark with clouds, the wind had picked up meaning a storm was incoming. There was another storm in my head, which was filled with every piece of information I had gathered on the Cullen's, the dots were being connected thanks to the new information Jacob had just provided me with. 

Had I unraveled Edythe and the mystery that she was? Did I even believe it? That they could somehow be vampires?


	7. Nightmare

When I got home that night, I went straight to the bathroom and showered. I tried not to think about Jacob's story. I tried not to think about every weird thing that happened around Edythe. I just focused on how good the warm water hitting my skin felt. And when I got out, I went straight for the medicine cabinet and swallowed some leftover Nyquil dad had. 

I wanted to sleep, just sleep, no dreams and no thoughts about Edythe or her family running through my mind. I was mentally exhausted, and I did not have the energy to try a wrap my mind around the information I had received. 

I washed down the medicine with some water from the sink and moved to my room, slipping into my pajamas and practically jumping into my bed, I fell asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. 

But as soon as my eyes closed, I saw her. Haunting my subconscious as much as she did my consciousness. 

I was in my grandmother's house in Puerto Rico, a house I had always been convinced was haunted. The old wooden house was creaking, I could hear a faint voice, a voice I knew. I was moving down the hallway, I held the only source of light, it was just a flickering flame from a small candle. 

"Bella," the voice whispered, calling me forward to find it. 

My heart filled with want, want to find the voice and the goddess behind it. I needed to find her. My feet moved slowly down the hall.

"Bella," it called again as I reached the end, but I was suddenly outside, on the cliffs of Frist Beach, the forest surrounded me and the wind blew out my candle. But I kept moving, almost like I knew where she was calling me from, where she was waiting for me. 

"Bella," she sounded closer now as I neared the end of the tree line and found myself looking at her back.

She was looking out into wide, wavering ocean. Wearing a black gown that moved sideways with the wind, exposing her leg. Her long bronze curls seemed to glow. I finally found her.

"Edythe," I called out, and she turned at the sound of my voice. 

That was when I realized this was no dream. Because this beautiful creature was covered in blood, and at her feet, laid Jacob. His eyes empty of life, his body positioned in an unnatural way and his neck was missing a piece, blood flowing slowly from it. 

My eyes widened at the picture in front of me, looking up to Edythe's red eyes in horror. She smiled, before suddenly she was in front of me, inches away from my face. I was paralyzed as her hands grabbed my face softly. 

"Don't you want me?" she purred.

I couldn't answer, she laughed, fangs visible as she lunged for my neck.

Then I woke up, gasping for air sitting up in my bed. Sweat covering my body, and my heart beating at an alarming speed. I ran a shaky hand through my hair, it got stuck in the curls and I sighed, looking at the clock on my bedside I saw that it was five in the morning. I was still drowsy from the Nyquil but I didn't want to allow my dreams to plague me again, so I got out of bed, looking at the window to find my dads cruiser was gone already. He had said something about going fishing with Harry Clearwater, whoever that was. 

I moved downstairs, grabbing a cold glass of water before chugging it, my throat was dry I needed the hydration. I kept my mind blank focusing on what I was doing, each step I was taking, scrubbing my body in the shower. Brushing my teeth, side to side, up, down. Until I couldn't handle it anymore and I found myself in front of my laptop in the old desk in my room.

I looked at the colorful letters that spelled out Google. Was I really going to search vampires? I would imagine I would come up empty handed. I mean, when you google vampire, I'm pretty sure you got a world of fiction in return. 

Still, I typed the word slowly. 

Vampire. 

I looked at the word for a minute before I clicked enter. I felt crazy doing it. This just isn't rational, but at the same time, could it be possible? I didn't see why not. 

The first result was from Wikipedia, an untrustworthy source.

A vampire is a being from folklore that subsists by feeding on the vital 

force of the living. In European folklore, vampires were undead beings

that often visited loved ones and caused mischief or deaths in the 

neighborhoods they inhabited while they were alive.

I frowned at the screen, this was enough for me to stop this research. I wasn't going to get anything in the internet that I didn't already know from common vampire knowledge. I closed it and sat back.

So, I was 99.9% sure Edythe wasn't human. Could she be a vampire? Yes, of course, why not. But she could also be any of the other thousands of myths that roamed the internet and old legends. I didn't believe she was evil, after all, she did save my life. I also didn't believe her family to be evil either, I mean her mother is a fucking doctor, for crying out loud. It just didn't make sense. 

This cult-like family was strange, unhuman. They didn't fit in; they were uncomfortably beautiful and strong. Their hearing was insanely good, and Edythe seemed to know what everyone around her was thinking, everyone but me. Answering questions before they were asked in class. She hadn't said no to the beach trip until she found out where we were going. Dr. Cullen is supposed to be nearing her forties, but she didn't look a day over thirty, she was just as young as the people playing her children. Supposedly they weren't related, but they share the same eyes. Eyes that changed colors. And according to Jacob, they were immortal beings who drank blood. Animal blood, anyway. 

My dads voice suddenly sounded in my head, "It's not really a good place to camp, people go hunting a lot there, lots of bears around,"

Then I remembered she skipped biology the day we were blood typing and a chill ran up my spine and I heard Jacob' voice this time, "though they don't hunt humans, you never knew when they might get too hungry and snap."

A rational part of my brain whispered but they go out during the day, and I remembered vampires aren't supposed to go out in the sun, they would burn. Wouldn't they? But there was never any sun in Forks, it would be the perfect hideout for a family of vampires. 

It all made too much sense, so I stopped obsessing about it and moved on to do something more proactive. Laundry. I spent my Sunday, which was another sunny day, one that I couldn't get excited about, doing laundry. When that was done, I headed to the supermarket and did the groceries before returning home and making myself some lunch. I took my sandwich along with a blanket and a random book I picked off my shelf and went out to the backyard, throwing the blanket on the sunniest spot before sitting down to eat. When I was done, I looked at the book I had blindly picked out. Rolling my eyes when I saw it was Interview with the Vampire by Anne Rice. 

Angry, I threw it away from my and laid down, closing my eyes. The next thing I know, I wake up to the sound of dad's car. Startled, I realized I slept for a long time. Long enough for the sun to go down and the clouds to move in. I jumped up, grabbing the blanket and the book and running back inside. 

"Sorry, dad, dinners not ready yet, I fell asleep outside," I told him as he entered through the door.

"That's okay, kid. Wanna order a pizza instead? Give you a break," 

I smiled and nodded, grabbing the catch of the day from him. 

The next day was sunny again, I smiled at the sun streaming in through the window as I got up and got ready for school. I threw on some jeans and a white v-neck shirt, before heading out I grabbed a flannel and my jacket, the jacket was just in case the weather to a turn. I didn't want to take any chances.

I was early to school, the parking lot was mostly empty when I got there, so I made my way to the picnic tables beside the cafeteria, sitting down on my jacket when I saw it was wet. I had worked on homework last night, mostly my English essay, so there were a few Trig problems that I needed to work on, though I was certain that most of them were wrong. I pulled out my notebook, with the intentions of actually working on the problems, but instead I ended up doodling in the back page. I focused on dragging wavering lines, to prevent myself from drawing her eyes again. But in the end, I ended up with seven pairs of eyes looking back at me. I sighed and shoved the notebook back in my bag.

"Bella!" my head looked up in the direction of the voice that had called my name, I found a short waring Mike making his way toward me and I nearly rolled my eyes.

"Hi, Mike," I wave as he sat down opposite me.

He grabbed a piece of my hair that was playing in the breeze, I pulled back and he dropped his hand, frowning, "Your hair has red in it,"

"Yeah, just in the sun, though," I replied, tucking the strand behind my ear.

He cleared his throat, "So, what you do yesterday?"

"Just worked on my English essay," I half told the truth. 

His frown deepened, cocking his head to the side, "What essay?"

"The one due on Thursday..." 

"Oh shit, right! I better get to that then. What's yours on?"

I leaned back as he leaned forward toward me, "Whether Shakespeare's treatment of female characters was misogynistic."

He looked back at me blankly. Like I spoke a foreign language and again I tried not to roll my eyes.

"So, listen, I wanted to ask you if you wanted to go out with me sometime, maybe have some dinner..." 

I looked back at him, annoyed, "Mike, I told you I don't like boys and still you decide to ask me out?" 

He frowned, looking down, "I was hoping that you, I don't know...

"That I'd be going through a phase? Maybe, that I'm confused? Or is it that you think you can change my mind?" I was beyond annoyed at this point. 

"No, I just like you, Bella, and I—"

I cut him off, standing up, "There's no real excuse. Don't try it, but Mike, maybe go for someone who actually shows interest in you. Like Jessica."

He looked up at me confused, "Jessica?"

I snorted, "You really are blind aren't you? Jessica likes you, you idiot."

"Huh," he furrowed his eyebrows, "That makes sense,"

"I'm willing to let this go, but, try that shit again with me and its over for whatever friendship we had," I said before leaving, I was going to be late to class.

I saw Jessica and Angela on the way to trig, they were both excited about the weather and were going on about a dress shopping trip to Port Angeles, I was invited, and I reluctantly promised to go. 

Throughout the whole morning, I was anxious to see if Edythe and her family were her today. On this beautiful, sunny day. I walked into the lunch room and immediately my gaze went to their table, my heart stopping when I saw it was empty. I looked around, maybe Edythe was sitting alone again? But she was nowhere to be seen, and a burst of anxiety flooded my chest. She wasn't here. 

I panicked at the thought that maybe she knew that I had figured it all out, triggering her disappearance. But a small voice in my head knew it had to be because of the shinning sun outside. I sat next to Angela, using her as a distraction. Mike had taken Jessica's attention from us. 

Walking into the Biology classroom made me realize that I had been holding out for hope. Hope that I would find Edythe sitting quietly in her seat next to mine, but when I found it empty, again, my heart sank. I was almost sad. Like I missed her. I shook my head as I took my seat. This can't be happening. I knew I was hooked, but I didn't know my affliction for her was this bad. 

The rest of the day dragged, I barely talked to anyone. Only half listening to Jessica go on about how Mike asked her out for dinner, postponing our Port Angeles trip for tomorrow. I was looking forward to the distraction, but I was excited for her, she was starting to grow on me.

When I got home, I got right to cooking, putting dad's catch from yesterday. My mood was still gloomy, so I decided to call my mom. 

She picked up on the first ring, "Move it to the left, Phil, to the left!" she shouted, "Bella! Hi honey!" 

I laughed, my mood brightening up already, "Hi, mami, I miss you,"

"Oh, I miss you too, querida. When are you coming to visit me?" She asked, the tone in which she asked the question was more demanding, like I didn't have a choice.

"I'm not sure, maybe around spring break?" I suggested.

"That's perfect! I'll get you all to myself for a week. Oh, honey, you're going to love Florida, who knows maybe you'll want to stay," she said.

Did I? "I don't know mom, Forks is kinda growing on me. I like living with dad,"

"Ahuh, is dad the reason why Forks is growing on you or does this have anything to do with a girl?" Her question was full of suspicion and I knew I'd be caught.

"Um, maybe?" I really couldn't lie to my mom.

She laughed, "I knew it! Tell me all about her."

I rolled my eyes, "Well, she's kind of weird," 

"Oh, Bella, weird is clearly your type based on your past crushes," 

My mouth fell open, "Ma! That is so rude,"

"Am I wrong?" she laughed.

I huffed, "No... But Edythe is just, different, more so than anyone I've ever met, and she's like really fucking beautiful,"

"Sounds like you're smitten, my dear," she teased. "Does she know how you feel? Does she feel the same?"

I frowned, "I wouldn't be surprised if she knew, she's pretty... intuitive. And I doubt she feels the same, I don't even know if she likes girls, though she offered to take me to Seattle on Saturday,"

"I think your have your answer there," 

"Do I? Because one minute she wants to be friends and the next she says it's better if we weren't friends. She's very hot and cold."

"Maybe she's struggling with how she feels? You never know. And you'll never know until you ask her."

"I think I will. But, um, also... I kind of found out something personal about her, something that I shouldn't know, and I don't know what to do with this information. It's driving me nuts, ma." I needed motherly advice, I wasn't going to tell mom that I was crushing on a vampire but maybe she had some words of wisdom to share on how to go about confronting her. 

"What kind of thing?" she asked. 

"It's something too personal to share with anyone, ma," I replied.

"Hmm, well, maybe you should let her know that you know about it. Honesty and communication are the two most important things in any kind of relationship. But, Bella, be careful. Be open enough to allow love in but also guarded enough to protect yourself."

We hung up soon after that, dad came home and we ate, I informed him I would be going to Port Angeles with Jessica and Angela tomorrow and he offered me some money. I declined, but he insisted, and I gave in. 

"Do you want me to leave something out for dinner?" I asked him in the morning, it was another sunny day.

"Bells, I had been feeding myself for seventeen years before you got here, don't worry about me, I'll manage," he replied, smiling at me as he moved to the door.

"I don't know how you managed, old man," I chuckled, making him laugh too.

I hung around the house after he left, leaving when I had ten minutes until my class started. I planned this just to be able to see whether or no the shinny black Porche was parked in its usual spot. But it wasn't, and I couldn't find it anywhere else.

I sulked the rest of the day. after school, Jessica followed me back home so I could drop off my truck before we headed to pick up Angela. She slid in the back and my mood picked up as we exited the town of Forks.


	8. Port Angeles

Jessica drove five above the speed limit, so we made it there pretty fast. Port Angeles was beautiful, much livelier than Forks. It had a romantic feel to it and I found myself imagining being here with Edythe, walking had in hand at the board walk, or window shopping through the cute shops along the streets. I quickly shook those thoughts away as Jessica stopped at a department store, she was visibly excited as we walked in, moving straight for the dresses.

I was never really into shopping, I liked clothes, but I hated the process of looking for them. It could get tiring, so I hung back, sitting in a bench in the changing room and giving the girls my opinion. 

"What about this one?" Jessica asked as she stepped out in a midnight blue dress that complemented her eyes. 

"Beautiful, it goes with your eyes," I replied. 

"I know right?" she smiled, as Angela stepped out in a lavender colored dress.

"You look amazing!" Jessica gushed.

I nodded along, "That's definitely the one, Ange,"

Angela blushed slightly, "Thank you, I think so too," 

"Eric is going to die when he sees you," Jessica laughed. "And Mike's not going to know what hit him," she added. 

"You're really not gonna go, Bella?" Angela asked, moving back inside the dressing room.

"No, it's not really my thing," I said.

"Would you mind changed if Edythe asked you?" Jessica asked, moving to the dressing room with a red dress. "You like her, don't you?"

I sighed, "Is it that obvious?" 

"No," "Yes," I got two answers at once, the first from Angela who had excited the dressing room dressed in her regular clothes again, she was holding the lavender dress. 

"Don't lie to her, Angela. But don't worry Bella, I think she's interested too. Though you might want to let Taylor down now, before it gets too complicated. No body likes a love triangle,"

"Taylor? What do you mean?"

Angela answered for Jessica, "Well, Taylor said she's taking you to prom. That's why Lauren doesn't like you," 

"I'm sorry, what?" 

Jessica stepped out then, "I told you it wasn't true," she chuckled.

"Wow, Jess," Angela gushed.

"Damn," I agreed.

The dress Jessica had one was definitely beautiful, it had a high slit that showed off her leg. It was also low cut, but not too low. It was perfect for her. 

"Enough to make you forget about Edythe?" she winked at me.

I laughed, "No, but a good try,"

They moved on to accessories, but I told them I wanted to check out a bookstore while they finished up. I left, saying I'd meet them up later at the restaurant we were planning on eating at. I exited the store and turned up the street, I didn't know where I was going but I was bound to run into a bookstore. I walked for twenty minutes, taking notes on how many times I turned and where. Eventually, as I was about to give up and head back, I found exactly my kind of shop. It was a bit witchy, the store, behind the register sat an elderly woman with kind eyes that seemed to be all knowing. 

I smiled at her, moving around the aisles admiring the crystals and turning my head at the herbs. I stopped at a tarot card deck, which reminded me of my grandmother. She used to read them, I thought about getting it, but I eventually moved away. Toward the books, I browsed around until my eyes stopped at one. 

The Mythical Creatures Bible it was called, and it made me think. If vampires, and possibly werewolves, were real... what else could be out there. I grabbed it without a second thought and moved to the register, the lady rung me up and I left the store twenty dollars poorer. 

It was darker now than when I had gone in, the streetlamps were on and there were just a few whispers of sunlight still in the skies. I moved in the direction I'd come in, worried I might get lost in the darker streets. But I found my way, until I got to a certain street that I didn't remember I began to worry. I moved the knife dad had given to me when I was fifteen from my purse to the waist band of my jeans. A girl could never be too careful.

I looked around, had I come in from the right or the left? I think it was left, so I took the turn, which led me to a dark alley. Definitely, not left. I stopped, and at the end a group of men began heading my way. Quickly I turned around hoping they hadn't noticed me. I took the right turn this time, it was an empty but lit street that I remembered. Behind me I could hear footsteps so I threw a glance backwards. There were two of them behind me. 

"Hey!" one of them called as the other whistled. 

My heart began to pound, I wasn't safe. I hurried forward, taking another right this street was darker, empty. I looked behind me, the guys were still there. I went to turn back and suddenly I hit someone. 

"Where you goin'?" he asked and I moved back, heart racing faster now. 

"Don't touch me," I warned, trying to go around him but he grabbed me, I quickly threw my knee up, hitting him in the groin. "I said, don't touch me,"

He groaned, folding over and I moved way down the sidewalk, the others were too close though, one pulled me back and I grabbed the knife, snapping it open with a click and swinging my arm around. The blade caught his cheek, he yelped pushing me away and into the street. 

"You bitch!" he yelled, the last one had moved back, seeing me as a threat. The one I'd hit moved away also.

But this one, he kept coming at me. I moved to run but an incoming car at the end of the street stopped me. It was coming in fast, I tried to move out of the way, but it swirled around missing me by a few inches before the passenger seat flew open.

"Get in!" She growled, and I obeyed. 

Edythe had saved me for the second time since I've met her.

Inside, I looked at her. she was glaring at the men, who had taken off running down the street.

"Wait here," she said, moving to get out of the car.

Put I grabbed her arm, making her look at me, her eyes were filled with fury and I spoke, pleading, "Please, don't. Don't leave me," 

My heart pounding heavily, my breath was hard to catch, and I felt sweat beginning to form on my forehead. 

She looked at me, then closed her eyes, "Put your seatbelt on," she finally said.

She reopened her eyes and suddenly we were moving backwards, coming around a corner barely stopping the car before she put it in drive, and we were moving forward. I realized I was still holding her hand and reluctantly let go. Putting on my seatbelt before realizing I was still holding my pocketknife.

"Are you okay?" she asked, "Are you hurt at all?"

I looked back her, closing the bloody knife before dropping it in my purse, "I'm fine, are you okay?"

"No," she snapped her eyes burning with fury.

We came to a screeching stop and I looked around, finding nothing but darkness and trees. Clearly, we were no longer in town. I stayed silent, I wasn't really what to say or do. I just stared at her with wide eyes. 

"Just give me a minute," she said her eyes closing again. 

And I did, because I needed a minute myself. I stayed silent, looking at her and focusing on slowing my heart down. Thoughts of what just happened ran through my mind and I wanted to cry, but I decided not to. I could cry later in the shower.

She sighed, finally looking at me, "Can you wait here for a moment? I'll be right back,"

"No," I shook my head, grabbing the hand she had on the wheel, it was cold and hard but also soft and warm at the same time, "If you go, I'm coming with you,"

She frowned, "I can't let them get away with what they've done," 

"I don't like it either, but I can't be alone right now," I whispered. 

Her eyes soften, "Fine." 

"Good," I breathed. "If I let go you wont escape, will you?" 

She smiled, "I suppose not, if you're that opposed,"

I sadly let go, removing my hand from hers. It had gotten numb under her touch.

"Are you better now?"

She took a deep breath, "Not really,"

"What's wrong, Edythe," I liked the sound of her name in my voice a little too much.

Her eyes darkened, "I don't know if you've realized, Bella," I liked my name in her mouth too, "But I have a bit of a temper. It's hard for me to keep it in check once it has been triggered,"

I stayed quite as she continued, "Do you realize what they were going to do? Those vile men, they were going to, god I can't even say it," 

"I know, I can't either and I don't want to think about it. I just want to forget," 

She nodded, "I'll give it to you, though. You held you own, for a clumsy accident-prone human, I'm impressed,"

"Thanks," I smiled. 

"So, I'm not allowed to teach those pigs a lesson in manners?" she asked.

"No, please." I answered.

She shook her head, "How disagreeable." 

We sat in silence for a while, this allowed my mind to point something out, how could Edythe possibly know where I was? And had she planned to chase down those men by foot when she asked me to wait in the car, in the middle of nowhere. At this point, was she trying to hide her secret from me or standing in front of me with a big neon sign that said vampire?

And then in occurred to me that that was the first time since she rescued me tonight that I related that word to her.

She looked at me at that same time, for a second I wondered if she would read my mind but then with a sigh she checked the clock.

"Your friends must be worried about you," she said. 

It was past six-thirty and I knew she was right. I was late in meeting them.

Without another word she restarted the engine and we were racing of back to town. I was sick to my stomach, she was driving way too fast and we were suddenly in town before I could even blink. She was moving through the boardwalk effortlessly, moving around the slower cars. I could see the Diner I was supposed to meet Jessica and Angela at, there was an empty spot right in front and Edythe slid into effortlessly. 

"How did you know... What are you doing?" she was already out the car.

"Taking you to dinner." She stated, throwing me a dimpled smile and a wink that made my heart stutter. 

She shut the door, and I moved to get out of the car. 

I could see Angela and Jessica pacing around the front of the Diner, their faces filled with worry. 

"Stop them before I have to track them down too, we wouldn't want me to run into your other... friends, I wouldn't do a good job at restraining myself," she said, her honey-like voice sounding oddly menacing.

I moved forward, "Jess! Ange!" I called out as they began walking away.

"Bella!" Jessica saw me first, her worried face when from relieved to surprised in under a second. 

"We were so worried!" Angela moved forward and caught me in a surprising hug, she was unfazed by Edythe. "You are not allowed to go odd on your own anymore," she said sternly. 

"Oh, hi, Edythe," Jessica had joined us, a small smirk playing in her lips. 

"Hello, I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. We just ran into each other and lost track of time... I hope you don't mine," she said, a convincing guilty look appeared on her face.

"Oh no, it's okay, I mean that happens right," Jessica elbowed Angela.

"Do you mind if I join you for dinner?" Edythe asked.

Angela spoke this time, I stood quietly watching the bizarre conversation, "Actually we already ate, but you can keep Bella if you promise to get her home safe,"

"I can get me home safe," I said, slightly offended.

Edythe ignored me, giving Angela a dazzling smile, "I promise," 

We exchanged quick goodbyes, before me and Edythe entered the Diner. A sweet elderly woman greeted us, telling us to sit wherever we'd like. Edythe led me to a lonely booth by the window, away from the few customers in the Diner. 

We didn't wait very long before our waiter arrived, his eye full of awe as he looked at Edythe. And I found myself relating to the guy. He handed us menus before clearing his throat.

"Um, Hello, what can I get you guys to drink?" he asked us, well, asked Edythe. 

She smiled her dimple smile, muttering a hello before looking at me expectantly. 

"Oh, I'll have a coke," I said, and the waiter looked at me for the first time.

"Two cokes, please," she smiled at him. 

He nodded as he walked away backwards, stumbling over his own feet a few times. 

"That was a bit unprofessional..." She commented. 

I rolled my eyes, "Edythe, you dazzled him with your dimples."

Her eyebrows pulled together, "Excuse me?"

"Don't tell me you don't know the effect you have on people," 

She looked thoughtful, "I suppose I'm not as preceptive as I thought myself to be, but then again no one has ever accused me of hypnotism by dimples before. I wonder... does it work on you?" 

I sighed, shaking my head, "All the damn time,"

She grinned at me, my heart reacted, and I looked away, "Stop,"

The waiter returned then, placing our drinks in front of us, I hadn't had a chance to look at the menu, so I skimmed through it while he spoke, "Are you guys ready to order?" he asked, he was just speaking to Edythe again.

"Bella?" Edythe said. 

"I'll just have a cheeseburger," I said, looking up at the waiter, surprised to find him looking at me. 

"That'll be all, thank you," she dismissed him. 

He grabbed our menus and disappeared again. I looked down at my coke, realizing for the first time that my throat was aching for something to drink, I picked it up and downed it. Grateful for the way it refreshed me. 

Edythe pushed hers to me, and I shook my head, "I'm fine,"

"I'm not going to drink it," she said. 

Nodding, I picked it up too, I drank half of it shivering after. 

"Are you cold?" she asked.

I shook my head, "its just the soda,"

She still shrugged out of her black leather jacket, handing it to me, I was about to say that I had my own but realized I actually didn't, I must've left it in Jessica's car. So, I grabbed the jacket from her, my cheeks hot with blush as I put it on.

"Thanks," 

"It looks better on you," she smiled, leaning in before frowning, "How are you?"

I furrowed my eyebrows, "What do you mean?" 

She raised one eyebrow, "Your latest near-death experience, did you forget,"

I actually had, but as she mentioned it, I saw flashes of them, "I'm fine."

"Are you sure? You don't feel sick? Or dizzy?" 

I did feel dizzy, but it was from being dazzled by her, "I'm fine, Edythe, I promise," I said, smiling. 

Her eyes narrowed, "I don't know how you can be so nonchalant about this. Normal people would be going into shock, then again, you're not so normal, are you?" 

I grinned, "I'm the most normal person I know."

"Everyone thinks that about themselves," 

"Hm, do you think that about yourself?" I challenged. 

She pursed her lips. 

"Right, you don't like to answer my questions,"

"It all depends on the question,"

"And what questions am I allowed to ask?"

Her face turned pensive as the waiter came back with my food. Making me realize we were subconsciously leaning into each other, as we both straightened up. He set the plate in front of me, making my stomach growl before he turned to Edythe.

"Did you change your mind?" he asked. 

"Some more soda would be nice," she said, looking at me rather than him. 

He grabbed the glasses and left again. 

"You must have a couple questions for me," She murmured.

"Hmm, more like a couple thousands," I replied.

She looked at me through her long lashes, her golden eyes curious but also full of worry, "Would it be unfair of me to ask you a question?"

I shrugged, taking a fry and popping it into my mouth, "What do you wanna know?"

She leaned forward, her voice dropping to a whisper, "have you made any progress in figuring out what I am?"

My breath stopped; I wasn't expecting her to ask that. Not now, not in the middle of a Diner where everyone was looking at her because they have never seen a woman more beautiful than her. I knew I had made progress, but did I want her to know that? How could I say 'vampire' out loud without sounding stupid?

Her expression changed to a look of almost sadness, "That bad?" 

"Can we talk about it later in the car?" I asked. 

She nodded, "Very bad, then," she whispered to herself, her expression turn to that of someone who had been defeated. 

"Actually, it's because I know that if I answer your question first I know none of mine will be answered, so, you're in the hot seat first," 

Her face relax and so did my shoulders, "An exchange, then?"

"Yes," I said, taking a bite of my forgotten burger after. 

The waiter returned with our, well, my drinks. He set them down in front of us and disappeared without a word. I ate a few more bites, allowing Edythe to think about the compromise I had offered. 

"I suppose that's fair, we can try." She finally said, "But no promises,"

I nodded, swallowing my food before answering, "Okay, what brings you to Port Angeles tonight?"

She looked down, folding her hands on the table, before glancing at me through her long lashes again, her mouth forming into a smirk, "next,"

"But that's the easiest one!" I objected.

She shrugged, motioning for me to continue. 

I shook my head, eating more of my burger as I thought of another question. I had tons flyinf around my head but I couldn't catch one that I wanted to ask right now. 

Until I did, then I looked up at her, she was already looking back, I threw a playful glare as I tried to find the words, "okay, let's say, hypothetically, that... someone... could read minds, with a few exceptions," I knew I was sounding stupid already.

She looked at me calmly, he face not giving anything away, "Just one exception... hypothetically."

"Oh fuck," my eyes widen in surprise. 

She laughed a little, then waited patiently as I took a sip of my soda. Trying to recover. 

"Just one exception, then. How would something like that work? Are there limitations? How would that someone find someone else at exactly the right time? How would she even know I was in trouble?"

"Well, hypothetically, if that someone"

"Let's call her Pendeja," I suggested.

She laughed again, "Okay. If your hypothetical Pendeja,"— I threw her an impressed look for her perfect Spanish — "had been paying better attention, the timing wouldn't have needed to be quite so exact," she rolled her eyes. "I don't think I will ever get over your attraction to danger. How does one do that? Get into so much trouble so consistently in such a short amount of time?"

I ignored her, "How did you know?" 

She looked like she was wrestling with her thoughts. Like she didn't know whether or not to tell me the truth. I put my hand over hers, her eyes focused back on me. 

"You can trust me," I assure her. 

"I want to, but I'm not sure if its right," she admitted. 

"Please," I asked. 

She sighed, hesitating before the truth came pouring out of her, "I followed you to Port Angeles. I have never tried this hard to keep a specific person alive before, it's actually much more troublesome than I would have expected, but that probably because its you. Ordinary people go about their days, years even, without as many catastrophes as you find yourself in frequently. You are a true magnet for trouble, anything dangerous within a ten mile radius of you will invariably find you,"

I know I should've found it creepy to find out that she was following me, but, I didn't and it didn't even bother me. I found it almost endearing to know that she tried that hard to keep me alive. Then I thought about her question... Do you think I could be dangerous?

"let me guess, you believe yourself to be one of those dangers I attract?" 

She took her hands back, "Unequivocally,"

"You've saved me twice now, though. Thank you," I said.

She looked at me, her face bothered. 

"I mean," I started, trying to ease the tension between us, "Did you ever think my number was up the first time, and that you messed with fate when you saved me. Now I have death following everywhere I go?"

Her frown deepened, my joke not amusing her, "That wasn't the first time I saved you, your number was up the first day I met you. I saved you from myself then."

She was talking about that first Biology class. The dark look she gave me crossed my mind. If looks could kill.

"You remember? You understand?" she asked, her eyes back on me, her beautiful face serious. 

"Yes,"

"And yet, here you sit," She said. 

"Here I sit, because of you. Because you knew where to find me, which you haven't finished telling me exactly how you did it,"

She narrowed her eyes at me, almost like she was waiting for me to start freaking out but that was never going to happen. When she realized, she huffed a sigh and continued with her story while I pick up my half-eaten burger, eating as she continued.

"I was keeping tabs on Jessica's thoughts; I didn't notice when you left. When I did, I started driving around, hoping someone had noticed you. I found the store you had gone into, but you had already left, so, I continued to drive around in circles... then, just as the sun was setting giving me an opportunity to follow you on foot, I heard what those low-lives were thinking. I saw your frightened face in their heads. I heard what they were planning to do, I saw you trying to fight them off." Her jaw was clenched by the time she finished; her eyes full of fury. 

I stayed silent, and she continued, "It was hard for me to drive away from them without making them pay, for you, for the other women. Scum like them should not be allowed to walk the earth. But still, I drove away for you. You didn't feel safe, and you were my priority,"

My heart skipped a beat, blood rushing to my face and she moved uncomfortably. But allowed me to put my hand on top of hers again. 

"That's one of the reasons I didn't want you to leave with Angela and Jessica. To keep you safe." She took a deep breath, "Are you done eating?"

I nodded, "Yeah,"

"Let's get out of here then, may I have my hands back?" she smiled,

I blushed, "Oh yeah," I said before I removed them. 

She laughed, calling the waiter over as she got up, I followed behind her.

"How are you d—" he started to ask.

"We're done now, thank you. That ought to cover it, no change," she said, dropping a hundred-dollar bill before turning to leave.

I followed behind, leaving the stunned waiter. 

We exited the diner, she moved quickly and gracefully to the car while I followed behind. She had left it unlocked I realized as she opened the passenger door for me, smiling slightly. I got in and she was sitting next to me in what seemed like the blink of an eye. She eyed my seatbelt and I put it on, making her smile. 

"Now," she grinned. "Your turn,"


	9. Theory

"But you never answered my mind reading question," I objected as she sped down the quite street a little too fast. 

"Oh, come on," she complained.

"No, seriously. You didn't tell me how it works. Can you read anyone's mind, anywhere? How does it work? And can the rest of you family do the same thing?" 

The dark car and the privacy it offered made it easier for me to ask these absolutely insane questions. As we raced back to Forks, the low gleam of the dashboard gave me a sense of security. 

It seemed like reality was on pause, I think she felt it too. With normality on hold she casually answered.

"It's just me. And I have to be fairly close to someone in order to hear their thoughts, the more familiar someone's mind is to me, the farther away I can hear them. But still, no more than a couple miles." She pause thoughtfully. "It's like being in a huge hall full of people, everyone is speaking at once. It's just a buzzing of voices that I cant make out what their saying until I focus on one voice and what they're thinking becomes clear.

"It can be very distracting, I usually tune it out. That makes it easier to seem more normal"—she frowned at the word—"sometimes I answer someone's thoughts, accidentally,"

"Why do you think you can't hear my thoughts?" I asked curiously.

She shook her head, "I don't know. Maybe your mind works differently from most people. Like I'm only getting FM frequency and your mind is set to AM," she grinned, amused.

"I always knew there was something off about me. It's nice to get confirmation that I'm a freak," I laughed. 

"I hear voices in my head and you're somehow the freak in this situation," she laughed with me. "It's just a theory anyway, which, brings us back to you,"

Her face was serious now, and I frowned, trying to think of the words to say.

I looked away from her, my eyes wondering around while I gathered my thoughts when I notice the speedometer.

"Holy shit!" I shouted.

"What's wrong?" she asked, startled and looking left and right rather than straight ahead. But still the car didn't slow down.

"You're going one-ten!" I was still freaking out, never have I ever driven this fast, hell my truck couldn't make it past fifty, I'm sure.

I looked out the windows in a panic, seeing nothing but darkness. Ahead, the road was a blur beneath the headlights, the trees gave the illusion of us being in a narrow tunnel. 

"Relax, Bella," she rolled her eyes but didn't slow down.

I calmed my voice, "There's no hurry, Edythe," 

"I always drive like this," She turn to wink at me, grinning.

Any other time I would've melted at that but I was not okay, "Keep your eyes on the road!"

"I've never even crashed unless it was on purpose, never even gotten a ticket," she grinned again, tapping her head, "Built in radar detector,"

"Please, for my sake, slow down,"

She sighed, the needle dropping to eighty, "Better?"

"Acceptable," 

"I hate driving slow," she muttered, "But enough commentary on my driving. I'm still waiting for you to answer my question."

I forced my eyes away from the road, but I didn't even know where to look. I didn't want to have to look at her face when I forced the word out of my mouth. She must've noticed my anxiety. 

"I promise I won't laugh this time," She said gently, taking hold of my hand. 

"I'm not worried about that," I whispered, nervously interwinding our fingers. Surprised when she didn't pull away. 

"Then what?"

"I'm worried about making you upset. Unhappy," my voice was still whispering.

She squeezed my hand lightly, "Don't worry about me, I assure you I can handle it," 

I absentmindedly started rubbing her thumb carefully with mind, her skin was soft. Satin-like and cold. But also, there was a fire between both of our hands that I liked. I liked being able to touch her, and I was scared to lose the ability to touch her once I told her what I knew. 

"Bella, the suspense is killing me," she whispered. 

"Sorry, I just don't really know where to begin," 

"Why don't you start at the beginning," she suggested, "Is this something you can up with on your own? Or did you draw inspiration from another comic book? Movie, maybe?" 

"I had help, not from comic books or movies,"

She waited while I found my words.

"Saturday, at the beach, I ran into an old friend of mine—Jacob, Jacob Black. His dad, Billy, and my dad have been close friends since before I was even born," 

I looked up at her, she looked confused.

"Billy is one of the Quileute leaders..." 

Her confused face changed. Like someone paralyzed her abilities to moved the muscles in her face. No expression, and suddenly she looked like a statue, one that depicted a goddess of some sort. Beauty, definitely a goddess of beauty. 

I continued when she didn't show any signs of moving again.

"There was a Quileute woman on the beach, Sam. Lauren had made a comment about you to piss me off and she overheard. She said that your family didn't come to La Push. But I could tell there was another meaning to her words. Like you guys weren't allowed there, so I got Jacob alone to ask him what Sam really meant. He told me some stories... old Quileute legends... about your family,"

I jumped slightly when she removed her hand way from mind, "And what did Jacob Black tell you I was?"

I opened my mouth but struggled to say it. 

"What?"

"I don't want to say it," I admitted.

"It's not my favorite word either," her face warmed up, she appeared human again. "But not saying it will not make it go away. I think it just makes it more powerful,"

I agreed, so I said it, "Vampire," I whispered.

She flinched away.

I guess she was wrong, saying it out loud didn't make it any less powerful. Then I realized; the word didn't belong to her, that's what gave it the power to hurt her. The fact that she didn't accept it as her own. But that wasn't something I could tell her. It was something she had to discover by herself.

This felt real now. Talking about it with her made it feel like we weren't discussing myths and legends. Impossible things became possible around her. 

I was real now. And very powerful.

"And what did you do then?" she asked after a minute of silent driving.

"Well, I tried to do research on the internet. But that felt stupid, and useless. So, made a list of all the impossible things about you that coincided with Jacob's story,"

"And that convinced you?" she was speaking in a matter-of-fact tone. 

"Well, no. after that I just—" I stopped, looking at her.

"You what?" she pushed, curious kitten look appearing on her face.

"I just let it go. It didn't matter to me anymore, it wasn't going to change anything," I said.

Her eyes grew wide as she turned to look at me. The they turned furious, she glared at me as the speedometer needle move quickly up to ninety-five. I began to worry about the winding road ahead of us.

"Um, Edythe—" 

"It doesn't matter?" she half-shouted at me, her voice growing cold with each word. "It doesn't matter?"

"No..." I looked at her nervously. 

"You don't care that I'm a monster? That I'm not even human?" 

"No..." 

She looked ahead again; her eyes still angry. I could feel the car slowing down.

"I didn't want to upset you... I should've kept my mouth shut,"

Her face softened, and she shook her head, "No, no. I'd rather know what you're thinking, even if it is insane,"

"Sorry," 

She blew out an exasperated sigh, then we grew silent for a few minutes. Her hand had moved to the gear shift and I hesitated before I decided to go for it and grabbed it again. She looked at me through warm eyes, still, her stare was... pained.

"What are you thinking about?" she asked, calmer now. 

"Nothing really... "

She sighed again, "That really drives me absolutely insane, not knowing"

"Okay, I have a few questions in mind. I'm very curious,"

"You can ask, you know."

"Okay... How old are you?"

"Seventeen,"

I rolled my eyes, I know she knows that wasn't what I meant, so I tried again, "How long have you been seventeen?"

She smirked, eyes gleaming with mischievously, "A while,"

It was my turn to sigh, "Okay,"

"Anything else?"

"Yes... So this has been bugging me for a while, how can you go out in the daytime?" 

She laughed, making me smile, "Myth,"

Her laughter had warmed me up, I liked when she was being herself. When she let me in, I hoped she would keep me because I wasn't about to let her slip through my fingers. With her was where I wanted to be, and with me was where I wanted her.

"Burned by the sun?" I continued.

"Myth,"

"Sleeping in coffins?"

"Myth," she hesitated for a second, and then added, "I can't sleep,"

"Wait... like at all?" 

"Never," she murmured.

"Oh honey, I am so sorry,"

She looked at me, confused.

"Sleeping is the best thing about life," I clarified.

She looked at me, her expression wistful, stupidly I held her gaze before her golden stare took my eyes captive and I had lost every thought in my mind.

Then she turned away, eyes narrowed, "You haven't asked the most important question, yet," 

"And that is?" I asked after recovering from her magic.

"Aren't you curious about my diet?"

"Oh, that one," 

"Yes, that one," she said, "don't you want to know if I drink blood?"

I pursed my lips, "Well, Jacob said something about that..."

"Oh, did he?"

"Yeah... he said you didn't hunt people. That your family wasn't supposed to be dangerous because you only hunted animals,"

"He said we weren't dangerous?" she asked skeptically.

"No, she said you weren't supposed to be dangerous. But still, the Quileute's didn't trust you enough to let you on their land."

"The Quileute's have a long memory," she whispered.

I took it as a confirmation.

"But don't let that make you complacent," she warned, "they're right in wanting us to keep our distance. We are still dangerous,"

"What do you mean?"

"We try... we're usually very good at what we do. But sometimes we make... mistakes. I'm making one in allowing myself to be so close to you,"

I was hurt, my voice gave it away, "This is a mistake?" 

"A very dangerous one,"

I was getting sick of that word. Her words didn't sound like a goodbye, but as I looked ahead, watching as she moved perfectly with the curving road, I began to worry. Worry that she was saying goodbye, worried that she would disappear from my life. I would respect her wishes, but I don't know what I would do with these growing feelings. Feelings that were far stronger than they should be. Hell, she hadn't even clarified if she liked girls or me in that way. I knew I had to ask her, before I ended up hurt or full of false hope.

I tried to build up the courage, but instead I decided to learn more about her while I still had her, "Tell me more,"

"What else do you want to know?" she asked.

"Why do you choose to hunt animals instead of humans?" I asked. 

Her answer was low and thick with sadness, "I don't want to be a monster,"

My heart ached for her, in my eyes she could never be a monster, but she couldn't see that. She was so against what she was that she didn't see herself for who she was.

"But animals aren't enough?" I questioned.

"To compare it to something you might understand, its like a human only living on a diet of tofu and soymilk; we call ourselves vegetarians, our little inside joke. It doesn't completely curve the hunger—well, thirst. But it keeps us strong enough to resist it. Most of the time," her tone darkened, "Sometimes it's more difficult than others," 

"Is it difficult for you now?"

"Yes," she frowned. 

"But you're not hungry now." I stated.

"How do you figure?"

"Your eyes, they're golden. I have a theory about that, the color is linked to your mood—people are always grumpier when they're hungry,"

She laughed, "You're way more observant than I give you credit for,"

I smiled as I listened to the sound of her laughter.

"So, everything I saw with the van, you stopping it, that happened."

"Yes," she shrugged.

"How strong are you?"

She looked at me from the corner of her eye, "Strong enough,"

"Like, could you lift thousands of pounds?" I asked enthusiastically, I wanted to see that.

She frowned at my excitement, "If I wanted or needed to. But I'm not much into feats of strength. They always make Emmett competitive, and I'll never be that strong,"

"How strong?"

"Honestly, I'm sure she could lift a mountain over his head. But don't tell him that, he will be convince he has to try it," she laughed, I noticed the affection in her words as she talked about her brother. I felt soft; I was an only child so I couldn't understand but it was sweet.

"Were you hunting with, um, Emmett?" it felt weird to say his name for whatever reason.

"Yes," she paused, hesitating before she spoke again, "I didn't want to leave, but it was necessary. It's a bit easier to be around you when I'm not thirsty,"

My heart skipped a beat and I was sure she heard it, and I blushed. She shifted uncomfortably and I tried to get my shit together. "Why didn't you want to leave?"

"It makes me anxious... being away from you," her eyes were intense, but there was also a softness about them. They also made it hard for me to breathe. "I worry too much about you. I was distracted all weekend. And after what happened tonight, I'm surprised you made it through the weekend unscathed. It was along three days, I really got on Emmett's nerves."

"Three days? I though you got back today?"

"No, we got back on Sunday."

"Then why weren't you at school?" I was a little annoyed, her absence really bothered me.

"Well, like I told you, the sun doesn't hurt us. But if we were to go out in the sunlight where people could see, then they would know we were different," 

"How?"

"I'll show you sometime," she promised.

"Why didn't you tell me you were back?" 

"What?"

"Edythe, I was freaking out thinking you had skipped town on me, and I was never going to see you again. I didn't know what I was going to do, I needed to see you again. Edythe, I really like you. Like, really fucking like you," my cheeks heated up.

She was quiet and I was scared I was going to get rejected, her expression was pained when she looked back up, "This is wrong," 

"Do you feel the same?" I asked, my breathing was shallow, and my stomach was in knots.

"I do, Bella. But don't you see? It's one thing for to make myself miserable, but a wholly other think for you to be involved with someone like me," she turned her agonized gaze to the road, her words flowing fast, I barely caught them, "I don't want to hear that you feel that way. It's wrong, it's not safe. I'll hurt you, Bella."

"Do I look like I care?" I asked, squeezing her hand in mine.

"That's a really stupid thing to say,"

"Maybe so, but it's the truth. I don't care what you are, I only care about you and who you are. It's too late for me,"

She was furious again as she said; "Never say that. It is not too late. I can still fix this and put everything back to where I found them. I will,"

Something about her tone was unsure, like she didn't believe herself. That gave me some hope. 

"I don't want things to go back to how they were," I mumbled, 

"I'm sorry I've done this to you," her voice was laced with regret.

I looked out into the road, realizing we were just entering Forks. "You haven't done anything to me. I'm a big girl, my decisions... and my feelings are my own."

She was silent.

"Will I see you tomorrow?" I asked.

"Do you want to?" she whispered.

"Yes, please," 

Her eyes closed but the car didn't begin to drift, it stayed right in the center of the lane. "Then I'll be there, I do have a paper to turn in,"

She turned back to look at me, her face was calm and soft, but her eyes were still troubled.

We pulled up in front of my house. The lights were on and my truck was right where I left it. Seeing this house was like waking up from a dream. A reminder that normality existed in my life still.

As I looked back at Edythe, I began to hope that the dream wouldn't end by some miracle. Or at least that it'll come back tomorrow.

"Save me a seat at lunch?" I asked, hopeful.

She smiled widely back at me, "I will."

I kept staring into her golden gaze, feeling like a paperclip under her magnetic eyes, like she was pulling me toward her, and I truly had no power to resist. I didn't even want to try to go against her pull on me, I enjoyed it way too much. I enjoyed the way she looked at me, the way she drew me into her, her voice, her touch, her laugh... I wondered, do her lips feel as silky smooth as the skin of her hand...

And then, her hand was gone from mine, she had place it an inch away from my face as she cringed away from me. Not from me, from the blood in my veins. Her eyes were wide, frightened, teeth were clenched. 

"Oh my god," I blushed, embarrassed, "I'm sorry!"

I could swear that she wasn't breathing as she looked at me. A moment of silence passing before she was able to relax.

"You have to be more careful, Bella," she finally said. "Maybe—"

"I can do that," I interrupted, "tell me what I can and can't do." 

She sighed, "Okay, don't fall asleep outside alone,"

I could feel my face changing to a look of surprise, "How did you know that?"

"I told you. I was worried, I needed to know that you were okay," she said. 

"Okay, but why?"

She frowned, looking out into the forest, "I'm not the most dangerous thing out there, Bella,"

I wanted to ask what she meant by that, but I figured that was a question that would upset her. "Okay,"

"I'll see you tomorrow, Bella," she smiled slightly.

"Tomorrow," I confirmed, hesitating as I opened the door before climbing out slowly and unwillingly.

"Bella?" 

I stopped, looking back at her, only to find her leaning in close to me, smiling as my breath hitched, "Sleep well," she said, her cool breath hiding my face and I was stunned. 

She leaned away as I tried to get my brain to work again, it took me a few seconds before I could murmur a goodnight and duck out of the car. I had to use the frame for balance and I could've sworn I heard her laugh as I stumbled all the way to the porch. I turned, watching her dark car blend into the night. 

I reached for my key and unlocked the door.

"Bella?" Dad called from the living room.

"Yea, dad it's me," I locked the door and went off to find him in the couch, a baseball game playing on the TV.

"You're home early," he stated looking at the clock on the wall. 

"Am I?" I lost all sense of time around Edythe.

"It's not even eight. Did you girls have fun?" 

I tried to remember how my night went, it seemed like it happened days ago rather than just hours, "Yeah, it was a lot of fun. They found dresses," 

"Are you okay?" he looked at me with a look of concern and I wondered how my face looked.

"Yeah, just tired we walked a lot," I lied.

"Maybe you should go lay down,"

"I will after I call Jessica," I said, moving to the kitchen.

"Maybe give her a chance to get home," he called after me.

By the time I reached the kitchen, my phone rang. I quickly dug through my purse and pulled it out, "Hello?"

"Bella?"

"Hey, Jess I was just about to call you."

"You made it home?" she asked, relieved.

"Yes, but I was gonna ask you to bring my jacket tomorrow, I left it in your car,"

"Got it. Now tell me what happened!" she demanded, excitedly.

Jessica wasn't as bad as I perceived her to be, I guess I just needed to spend more time with her outside of school to realize that. "Uh, I'll tell you tomorrow at school" 

"Oh you dad is there?" She caught on.

"Yeah," 

"Okay, then. I'll talk to you tomorrow, I want every single detail! Bye," I could hear the impatience in her voice.

"Bye, Jess,"

We hung up and I moved up to the fridge and grabbing a water bottle before making my way up to my room, grabbing my sleeping clothes before moving to the bathroom. I moved mindlessly, still reeling from the crazy night I had just had. It wasn't until I was sitting under the hot shower spray that I realized I was cold. Freezing, actually. I shuddered and hugged my knees to my chest, laying my forehead on them as the water fell on me. 

Nothing made sense except for a few certainties.

About three things I was absolutely positive about. First, Edythe was a vampire. Second, there was a part of her—that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with her. 

And finally, I was Royally fucked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!


	10. Interrogations

Waking up the next morning was weird. Everything was possible in the dark, easier. But when the sun came up, everything seemed like a dream. The last few weeks didn't feel like it happened. They felt like I made them up somehow. But my brain knew that wasn't the case, and in my heart, I knew she was real. I knew what she was, and yet I woke up slightly hazy but excited to get to school and see her again. 

I got ready and dressed quickly, pausing at the jacket that she had given me. I had draped it over my desk chair. I grabbed it, and at the risk of looking like an actual stalker inside the privacy of my own room, I pulled it up to my face and smelled it. The memories of last night flashed through my eyes, being closed to her. Her perfume, whatever it was, comforted me. I felt safe.

I draped it over my arm and grabbed my bag, looking out the window to see the perfect weather; foggy, dark and not a hint of sunlight peeking through. My heart stopped when my eyes drifted down into the street, where a black Porche was parked. I hurried down, jumping two stairs at a time, almost falling down them twice before I stopped in front of the door and tried to look normal. Like I wasn't abnormally excited at the fact that she was waiting outside for me.

I opened the door and locked it behind me. I tried to look casually as I walked to her car, but I felt weird walking, like I knew her eyes on me, so my body decided to betray me in order to make me look like an idiot in front of her. 

When I reached the passenger side of the car, she lowered the window and leaned over, "Hello," she smiled, "Would you like a ride to school?"

I was sure my face looked odd, because she laughed. I shook my head to clear my thoughts and opened the car door, "Yeah, thanks,"

I cleared my throat as she pulled away, "I brought your jacket, thank you for letting me borrow it,"

She nodded, "You should keep it, looks better on you, and I don't want you to be cold"

My heart stuttered, "It's okay, Jessica is bringing me mine," I regretted my words as soon as I said them, but I didn't take them back, instead I put the jacket in the backseat.

She smiled and I took in her appearance. She was wearing a knitted lavender sweater, one that had a V neckline and hugged her body so perfectly that it made me blush as I forced my eyes up to her face. Her hair was tide into a knot at the back of her head, a messiness of perfectly shaped curls, it framed her face perfectly. It exposed her slender neck in a way that made my mouth water... I wanted to kiss her right there.

But like she said, I needed to be careful. I knew that wasn't going to happen anytime soon. 

"What, no twenty questions today?" she asked, bringing me out of my inappropriate daydream.

"Did that annoy you last night?"

"No... it was just confusing. Your reactions I mean, when someone tells you they drink blood you're supposed to run away screaming. Gather an angry mob with crosses, stakes and fire. That kind of thing not confess your feelings for that person," she laughed. 

"Hm, good point. I'll see what I can do about the mob," I joked. 

"By all means, please do. I'll be waiting,"

We were silent, I could tell that my lack of screaming and running had frustrated her. She should get used to it, and me, because I wasn't running anywhere that wasn't toward her. 

"So, um, where's the rest of your family?" I asked as she pulled into the school. 

I was actually curious about her family, I wanted to know what they were like. Well, everyone but Rosalie, who was the only vampire that inspired true horror in me. 

"They took Rosalie's car," She gestured to a glossy red convertible with the top up as she glided into the empty spot next to it. "Ostentatious, isn't it?"

"Wow, if she has that, then why does she ride with you?" 

"Well, we try to blend in, like I said; it's ostentatious," she replied.

I laughed as I got out of the car, "Full offense, but you're all failing as that,"

She rolled her eyes, smiling.

"Why'd Rosalie drive today if it you're trying to be discreet?"

"She would say it was my fault. I'm breaking all the rules now, Bella,"

She met me at the front of the car, staying close to me as we walked to the school. I wanted to reach and grab her hand, interwind our fingers like last night. But I was afraid, afraid that wasn't being careful enough.

"Why don't you have a Honda? It'll help you blend in more," I laughed.

"it's an indulgence, really. We all like to drive fast,"

"Yeah, I noticed," I muttered. 

Jessica was waiting for me, with a smirk on her face, under the shelter of the cafeteria's overhang roof. Over her arm was my jacket. 

"Hey Jessica," I greeted as we reached her, "thanks for remembering,"

She handed me my jacket and I shrugged it on. 

"Good morning, Jessica," Edythe said politely.

"Hi..." Jessica smiled, before looking at me, "See you in English, Bella," 

"Yeah, I'll see you then," 

I worried about what I was going to tell her and what she was going to ask.

"What are you going to tell her?" Edythe asked.

"Why? What was she thinking?" 

She grinned, "That's not fair,"

"What? Of course, it is! You not sharing what you know is the only thing unfair around here," 

We kept moving forward as she deliberated. 

"She wants to know if we're dating, and how you feel about me," she finally said as we stopped outside of the gym.

"Oh god, what do I say? What would you say?" I kept my expression innocent.

"Hmm," she paused to move a curl away from my face and tucked it behind my ear. My heart stopped and then started racing in a short amount of time. "I suppose... you could say yes to the first one, since you know, it's kind of the truth and also the easiest explanation. If you don't mind, of course."

"I don't mind," I said, out of breath.

"And as for her second question," she paused, leaning in and stopping my shallow breath short, "I'll be listening in to hear the answer for myself," she pulled away, flashing her dimples at before walking away.

"I'll see you at lunch," she called over her shoulder.

What the fuck? I looked around, a few people were looking back at me with wide eyes and I hurried into the gym. 

"Morning, Bella," Mike greeted when I walked in. "How was Port Angeles?"

Insane, I wanted to say, "It was great, Jessica got a really hot dress,"

He perked up at Jessica's name, "Really? Did she mention anything about Monday?"

"Yeah, she had a great time, Mike,"

"She did?" he grinned.

"Yeah,"

Gym passed by in a blur, I stayed out of Coach Clapp's line of sight and managed not to do anything at all. I was walking nervously through the halls, after. Preparing myself for the interrogation Jessica was about to put me through. Not because of Jessica herself, but because Edythe was going to be listening in to what I was going to tell her, in regard to my feelings. I felt strangely self-conscious.

I was walking without thinking, I didn't see what was in front of me, so when I walked right into someone's hard back, I was shocked. I barely touched them; someone had pulled me back. 

"Oh shit," I shook my head.

I heard a laugh, "Careful there, you could get him killed." They said.

I looked sideways, then up, it was Archie. In front of me was Emmett, who also towered over me, making me feel extra small. I realized I was about to walk right into Emmett and Archie had pulled me back. 

"I'm s-sorry," I stuttered, looking up at Emmett. 

Now, I was scared, "Oh it's cool, little one." He grinned, patting my shoulder before walking away leaving me with my mouth hanging open.

I heard the same laugh and realized Archie was still standing next to me, I looked back at him, finding him smiling, "I can't wait until I'm allowed to actually speak to you," then he left without another word. 

I was speechless, it took the late bell to ring to get me moving again. I walked into English late and flustered.

Jessica was waiting for me when I walked in, she had ditched our usual seats by the front of the room and had taken one in the back by the windows, I sat down on the empty seat next to her. I braced for her questions; I usually wasn't one to talk too much about my personal life. 

"Tell me everything!" she commanded.

I laughed, "What do you want to know?"

"What happened last night?" 

"She bought me dinner, and then drove me home,"

"How'd you get home so fast?"

"She drives like a maniac. I feared for my life," I laughed a little, hoping she had heard that.

"So, it was like a date? Did you guys plan to meet?"

I shook my head, "No it was totally random, I got lost trying to get back to you and Angela and she found me," 

She put a hand over her heart, "Ugh, that is so romantic. Did she drive you to school or were you guys together all night?"

Her tone of voice and her expression were suggestive, "No! it's not like that, she picked me up this morning that's it," I hurried out, blushing.

"Not like that yet," 

I blushed harder and hid my face in my hands, "Jess!" she is listening to this!

"Okay, okay," she laughed. "Are you guys going out again?"

"She's taking me to Seattle on Saturday, mostly because she doesn't have much faith in my truck,"

"I can't believe. Edythe Cullen and you,"

"I know," I was in shock about it too.

"Wait! Have you kissed her? Has she kissed you?" she questioned leaning in closer.

I blushed again, "I wish," I said.

"So, you like her then?" 

"Yes," I confirmed.

"I mean, but do you really like her?" 

"Yes," I repeated, hiding behind my hair as my face heated up again.

"But how much?"

I sighed, "Too much, I think. More than she likes me, I'm sure,"

Mr. Mason called on Jessica to answer and question and I was saved. I was done speaking on the matter, and I didn't want her to keep asking questions about Edythe. She didn't get a chance to ask any more questions after that. And when we were walking through the halls on our way to trig, I took evasive action. 

"Mike asked about you. He wanted to know if you had said anything about Monday," I told her.

"You're kidding! What did you say?"

That was enough to distract her for the rest of the walk to trig, and then during trig as I tried to focus on the gibberish being taught. 

I felt excitement and relief when the bell rang, signaling the lunch hour. I shoved my books in my bag, jumping out of my seat. 

"You're not sitting with us today, are you?" Jessica guessed as she stood up.

"I don't think so," Edythe was still a flight risk.

We moved out the door and there, leaning against the wall like a Greek goddess, was Edythe. Jessica took one look, smirked and left us.

"See you later, Bella," she said as she walked away.

"Hi," she said, her voice was full of amusement making her eavesdrop obvious.

"Hey," I smiled, I could feel people looking but I didn't care. 

We began walking together, "Hungry?" she asked.

"Sure," I said, though I really couldn't tell if I was actually hungry through the killer bees attacking my stomach.

"I heard what happened with my brothers," she stated.

I had somehow forgotten about that, "I swear I don't usually walk into people, its mostly just walls..."

She frowned, "You would,"

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing, it's just. I saw how you looked in Archie's head. You were scared," 

"I usually am when it comes to abnormally tall people," I stated.

We entered the cafeteria and she led us to the lunch line, "Wait, so you were scared because of their heights?" 

"Well, I was also scared because out of all the people in this school that I could walk into, it had to be your brother... I don't think we're in the meet the family stage," 

She shook her head at me, "What am I going to do with you?"

I have a few things in mind... I thought.

She began to fill a stray with food, looking at me every few seconds. She seemed irritated and I was confused. I began playing with the zipper on my jacket nervously.

"That's a lot of food..." I commented as she paid for it.

"Half is for me of course," 

I raised one eyebrow as I began following her to the table we had sat in last week. A group of seniors turned their heads, looking at us with confusion. We sat across from each other. 

She pushed the stray to me, "Take what you want,"

I picked up an apple, looking at it like I was inspecting it. "I'm curious... what would you do if someone dared you to eat?" 

"You're always curious," she sighed, glaring as I watched with wide eyes as she picked up a pizza off the stray and brought it to her lips, taking a small bite before chewing it in disgust then swallowing it.

"If someone dare you to eat dirt, you could, couldn't you?" she asked.

"I did once..." I wrinkled my nose at the memory, "On a dare,"

She laughed, "That somehow does not surprise me,"

She shoved the rest of the pizza toward and I took a bite. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't good.

She laughed once, "Jessica is analyzing everything I do, she'll break it down for you later,"

"Oh Jess," I shook my head.

"Something you said to her is bothering me," she said, frowning again.

"I'm not surprised. People who eavesdrop tend to hear things they don't like," I said.

She leaned in, ignoring me, "Do you truly believe that you care more for me than I do for you?" 

Her liquid gold eyes held mine and again I found myself in a trance. I had to look away.

"You're that thing again." I sighed.

"What thing?" her eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"That dazzling thing you do to me," I accused. 

"Oh," her head tilted to the side. 

"I guess it's not your fault, you can't help it,"

"Are you evading my question?"

"Yes." I said, looking down.

"Yes, you're evading my question, or yes, you really think that?" I could hear a hint of irritation again. 

"Yes, to both," I finally said.

We stared at each other for a long time, I wasn't aware of the crowded and loud room around us. But then again, I never was when I was around Edythe. She was the only thing to exist, she held all my attention. 

She searched my eyes, before finally she spoke, "You couldn't be more wrong,"

Her voice was soft like velvet and warmer than my favorite sweater. 

I looked down at my hands, avoiding her eyes, "You can't know that."

Of course, I wasn't a mind reader. I couldn't know it either. But there was no way she felt the way I felt when it came to her. I was almost certain about that. I wanted to believe her words, my heart definitely believed them, it beats for them.

"What makes you say that?" she asked.

I looked up, regretting it instantly. When her eyes were involved, I would confess to a whole murder if it meant I could keep them.

I searched my brain for the words that would correctly express myself. She was visibly struggling to keep her patience. 

"Aside from my lack of extraordinary beauty... Well, I can't really be sure, but sometimes you speak in a way that makes me think that you're saying goodbye, without actually saying 'goodbye.' It's kind of annoying to be honest, because I don't want you going anywhere." I finally confessed.

She grabbed my hand, "You're perceptive. But you are more than extraordinary, trust me on that,"

"Why do you say goodbye every chance you get?" I asked, trying to not let her words get to me.

She sighed, "That's why I believe I care more. Because I can say goodbye and put your safety first. Although it seems like I might have to make keeping you safe my full-time job,"

"Fuck my safety, what about my happiness?" I challenged. 

She sighed, "Maybe you're right, I can keep you living, safe and happy,"

I smiled, "Good, I can do that for you too. Not as good a job, but still,"

She gave me a pained look, "Yeah,"

We stayed silent, holding each other's hand and taking in the comfortable silence. A second later she winced.

I gave her a questioning look and began pulling my hand away, but she held it.

"No, it's not you,"

"Then what's wrong?"

"Many different reactions." Her forehead crinkled. "Rosalie in particular has a strident mental voice,"

My eyes automatically moved to her siblings table. I regretted it instantly.

Rosalie was glaring daggers into Edythe's unprotected back, Emmett was shifting his eyes between her and Edythe, an amused expression plays in his face, like he was witnessing a fight. As soon as I looked, Rosalie's cold, hard gaze shifted to me. My eyes darted back to Edythe, shivers running through me, but she was already turned and was glaring back at Rosalie. Emmett turned, appearing to be talking to Rosalie and a second later she dropped her gaze and sulked down in her chair. 

Archie was laughing, his arm around Jasper who remained expressionless.

"Um, did I just piss off... vampire Barbie?" my voice dropped by the end. 

Edythe exploded in laughter, across the room I could hear Archie laughing as well, I dared another look and found Emmett had put his head down, shoulders shaking, and even Jasper cracked a smile. But Rosalie was scowling. 

"Now you did, before it was me," Edythe said, expression still amused and playful.

"Did I get you in trouble?" I asked, worried.

"No, you don't need to worry about me." She reassured me, face a little smug as she continued, "I'm not saying that Rosalie couldn't beat me in a fair fight, but I am saying that I have never fought fair and I don't intend to start now. He knows better than to step up to me,"

"Um,"

She laughed, "I'm only joking, Bella. It really just normal sibling issues, an only child wouldn't understand," 

"Sure," 

"I have another question for you," she changed the subject.

"Hm?"

"Do you really need to go to Seattle this Saturday, or was that just an excuse to get out of saying no to all your admirers?"

I glared at her, I didn't need to remember that last part, "I still can't believe you plotted to let that happen, you know she thinks I'm going to prom with her?"

"I heard, should I be jealous?" she joked.

I glared at her.

"Oh Bella," she looked like she was trying to hold a laugh in.

"What?"

"She already has her dress." She chuckled this time.

"Oh god," what was I going to do now?

"Don't worry it was bought secondhand and before she claimed you, she got a pretty good deal," 

I couldn't talk. She squeezed my hand, "You'll figure it out,"

"I don't do dances," 

"If I was the one to ask you would you have said yes?" she asked, curiously.

"Yeah, but then I would've broken my leg and made sure I couldn't make it," 

She laughed, "Why would you do that?"

"You clearly have never seen me in gym,"

"Are you referring to the fact that you trip on air?" 

"Maybe..." I had a suspicion that she would be eavesdropping at tomorrows torture hour.

She shook her head, smiling, "Back to the question. Must you go to Seattle, or would you mind if we do something different?"

I didn't care what we did as long as the we part was in the plans.

"I'm open to alternatives," I allowed. "But I have to drive."

She frowned, "Why?"

"Your driving scares the shit out of me and I'm not trying to have a heart attack. Also, I told Charlie I was going alone and I'd rather him not ask questions when he sees my truck is there but I'm not."

She rolled her eyes, "Out of all the things that could frighten you, you worry about my driving," she shook her head in feigned disgust, but then turned serious, "Why wont you tell Charlie you'll be with me?"

"With dad, less is more," I was sure about that, "Where are we going anyway?"

"Archie says the weather will be nice, so I have to stay out of the public eye and was hoping you'd stay with me,"

I suddenly grew excited, "And you'll show me what you meant about the sun?"

She smiled, "Yes, you should still tell Charlie," she paused, looking serious again, "it'll give me some incentive to bring you back."

"I'll take my chances," 

She glared, annoyed.

"Okay, new topic," I tried to distract her.

Through gritted teeth she spoke, "What do you want to talk about?"

I glanced over to her siblings table, Rosalie was gone now. Jasper and Archie were leaned in close, lost in their own world and Emmett sat next to them looking bored and like the definition of third wheel.

"Why did you go to that Goat Rocks place last week... to hunt?"

Charlie said it isn't a good place to hike because of bears?"

She looked at me like I was missing something obvious.

I gasped when I got it, "Bears?"

She smirked.

"You know bears are not in season..." I added, trying to cover my shock and pretending like this was a normal conversation.

"Yes, well, if you read the laws carefully, you'll see that they only cover hunting with weapons," she informed me.

"Bears..." I repeated.

"Grizzly is Emmett's favorite." She looked like she was scrutinizing my reactions and I tried to keep it together.

I hummed, taking a bit of my forgotten pizza.

"So," I said after a moment, "What's your favorite?" I asked curiously.

She raised an eyebrow, her face disapproving of the question, "Mountain lion."

"That makes sense," I nodded, like it was normal.

"Of course," she said, her tone just as casual as mine, "we have to be careful not to impact the environment with injudicious hunting. We try to focus on areas with an overpopulation of predators, we go as far as we need to. There are always plenty of deer and elk around here but where's the fun in that?"

She smiled.

"Where indeed," I nodded, taking another bite of pizza.

"Early spring is Emmett's favorite bear season—they're just coming out of hibernation so they're more irritable," she smiled at some remembered joke.

"ugh, there's nothing better than an irritated grizzly," I agreed.

She chuckled, "Please tell me what you're really thinking?"

I'm trying to picture how you hunt without weapons," I admitted. "But I can't,"

"Oh, we have weapons," she grinned, flashing her perfectly white teeth. "Just not the kind they consider when writing hunting laws. If you've ever seen a bear attack video, then you should be able to visualize Emmett hunting.

I glanced over at Emmett, he was already looking my way grinning ear to ear. The smooth lines of his muscles were clear under his shirt and suddenly I could see him holding a mountain over his head.

Edythe followed my gaze and chuckled at her brother. I looked back at her, more curious than ever.

"Is it dangerous? Do you ever get hurt?" I asked.

Her laughter rung out, "Oh, Bella. It's about as dangerous as your slice." 

I looked down at the pizza, "Scary. So, are you like a bear attack?"

"I've been compared to a lion," she said, "Perhaps our preferences are indicative,"

I tried to picture it, she was more kitten-like than lion-like so it was hard, "Is that something I might ever get to witness?"

"Never!" she whispered harshly. Her eyes were wide in horror and I was certain I'd stuck a nerve. She took her hand back, leaving mine cold and wrapped her arms around herself.

"What'd I say?" I asked, confused.

She closed her eyes, regaining control. Then, when she reopened them and met my gaze, she looked furious, "I almost wish that were possible because you don't seem to understand the realities present. It might be beneficial for you to witness exactly how dangerous I can be,"

"You should record it, then," I suggested.

She continued to glare at me, "we're going to be late,"

I looked around; we were basically the last two remaining in the lunchroom. Time had no meaning when I was with her, I lost track of everything and everyone outside of her. I got up with her, grabbing my bag. 

"Let's go then," I said, offering my hand. 

She smiled warmly, anger forgotten, and took it in hers.


	11. Complications

I knew everyone's eyes were on us, I could hear whispers as me and Edythe walked hand in hand through the hallways. I saw mouths physically drop as we made our way to our lab table, where I unwillingly let go of her hand so we could sit down. 

Unlike last time, she didn't sit as far away from me as possible. This time, she pushed her chair close to mine to the point where our arms touched. It was comforting, her touch, but at the same time it also pulsated electricity throughout my whole body. It made it impossible to think.

I watched as Mr. Banner backed into the room, pulling an outdated TV and DVD player on a wheel frame. Everyone in the room relaxed. I was relieved too, because with the way I was feeling right now, having the girl that my body and brain overreacted over so close to me made it impossible for me to follow a lecture. 

Mr. Banner inserted a DVD and walked across the room to turn off the lights. 

In the light, I was already hyperaware of Edythe but the dark room somehow enhanced that feeling. Electrical current flowed from her body onto mine, it was weird. I never knew a single person could cause so much disruption in me. My hand begged to hold hers, my brain told me no. Even though we had walked into this room holding hands, what if she didn't like it? She has to make the first move. 

I glanced at her; she was slightly taller than me. It was the first time I noticed, because she never made me feel small. She looked back down to me, smiling that dimpled smile that made me weak at the knees. Her eyes shined bright, they drew me in, and I felt the sudden urge to kiss her. But that wasn't being careful. 

I felt her hand on mine, stopping my internal battle between my rational brain and my impulsive body. She winked at me, tangling her fingers in my and I grinned back. For now, this was enough. 

It was a long hour; I didn't even know what the movie was about. Actually, I had no memory of even having watched the movie. I only had memories of her eyes, her smile. The way my hand felt in hers, the way the electricity pulsed from her to me. 

When Mr. Banner turned on the light I was disoriented. What just happened? Did she feel that? What the fuck? 

I took a deep breath and stood up, Edythe laughed once as she followed, leading me out of the room.

"Well, that was... interesting." She murmured.

"I..." I didn't know what to say. I felt drunk. 

She walked with me to history which was just a few seconds away. I turned to her outside. She didn't say anything, I didn't either. All I could do was look at her beautiful face. She dropped my hand, leaving it feeling lonely and raised it up to my face, hesitating before she brushed her fingertips across my cheek. It burned, despite her cold touch, I wanted to lean into it but she dropped it and whispered a quite goodbye before turning and walking swiftly and gracefully away. 

I was left stunned as I walked into my classroom and took my usual seat. I barely took notice of Mike next to me. I don't think my mouth was quite ready to speak yet. 

He turned to me, "Hey, Bella,"

"Hi," I forced out.

"So... You and Cullen?" I didn't like the tone in his voice.

"Yeah... me and Edythe," my voice sounded... smitten. 

"I don't like it," he said, my eyes went to his face. 

"You don't have to," I replied, slightly annoyed.

"It's just, she looks at you like you're something to eat," he explained.

I smirked, looking him dead in the eye, "To her, I am," 

His face turned red, catching on to what I meant. Angela, who sat in front of me choked on a laugh, which made me laugh. Mike was the only one without a sense of humor. He turned away from me and didn't say another word. Though the redness in his face stayed for quite a long time. 

Class droned on, I forced myself to focus on the notes I was taking rather then on the redheaded beauty who was driving me home later. It was the same in Spanish, for once I tried to focus on the easy task, we were given rather than on Edythe, I knew that if I focused my thoughts on her time would feel like it was going by painfully slow. 

In art, I focused on the lines I was sketching. My brain and hand worked together in synch, I focused on one thing at a time, not seeing the picture as a whole until the bell rang, frightening me slightly. I looked back at my work, seeing it for the first time. It was two girls, both with crazy curls falling down their back. They held hands, they stood in a field of wildflowers, surrounded by mountains that I had sketched out but not completed. I knew I had drawn me and Edythe, though the details on the girls weren't finished. I knew I was planning to surround them with lightning. I blushed slightly as I put it away, standing before walking out of the classroom. 

Outside, I found Edythe waiting for me. She smiled and fell into step with me. I blushed slightly, still not believing she was real and interested in me. 

"Hello," she smiled, dimples shining.

I grinned back, feeling happy, "Hi,"

"How was Art?" she asked as we exited the school building.

I hesitated, wondering if I should tell her about the drawing or if I was being creepy, "It was good... I drew something, I'll show you in the car."

She nodded, "I can't wait to see it,"

Mike brushed passed us in that moment, his head not turning to look back at us the way it usually did.

"Good job shutting him up, by the way," she chuckled.

My face turned red, "You weren't supposed to hear that,"

She looked slightly guilty, "I couldn't help it, his thoughts were so loud. It's been a while since someone had thought those kinds of words about me, beside my family. I don't think I like it,"

Her delicate face looked deadly, and I sort of felt worried for Mike. I was more than confident in her ability to take on someone twice her size. Hell she could take on the tallest, buffest body builder. If she wanted anyone hurt it would happen. She was dangerous, I knew that. I also knew she was too good to actually follow through with something like that. 

"What kind of words have you family been think about you?" I changed the subject as we neared her car.

"It's not fair to judge people on their thoughts, they're supposed to be private after all. It's only actions that matter,"

"But thoughts show who a person really is, and besides, if you know someone can hear wouldn't that be the same as saying it outloud?"

"Easy for you to say," she grinned, "My family tries hard to control their thoughts around me, but it can be very difficult. When Rosalie and I aren't on the same page, I think much worse things about her, and I do say those things out loud," her musical laugh rang and I smiled.

I hadn't been paying much attention to where we were head, well, I never pay attention to my surroundings when Edythe was around. I was surprised when we had to slow, Edythe's car was being blocked by a crowd of people. All of them were crowded around Rosalie's car, admiring it and talking amongst themselves. None of her siblings were around, if they were I was sure Rosalie wouldn't be too kind to her car's spectators. 

We moved around them and hoped into the Porche.

"As I said. Ostentatious."

I nodded in agreement as she pulled out of the parking space and sped off the parking lot in a move that had me rushing nervously to put my seatbelt on.i

Despite her reckless driving, I felt at ease to have privacy with her. Free of odd looks and whispers. 

"Looks like it's later now," I said. 

She frowned, "I suppose it is,"

I waited for her to talk, keeping my face calm and collected. She kept her eyes on the road but kept silent. I wondered if she was going to ignore me, when the car came to a stop, causing me to look up. I was surprised to see we had already made it to my house. 

I looked back at her to find her eyes were already on me.

"And you wanted to know why you can't see me hunt?" she asked, her voice was serious, but her expression was amused. Which surprised be, given her reaction in the cafeteria. 

"That and also why did you seem pissed when I asked?"

"I didn't mean to react so rudely. I apologize if I frightened you."

"No need to apologize, you didn't," I grinned.

She rolled her eyes and smiled, "Well, then I apologize for reacting the way that I did. It's just I'm passionate about keeping you safe. And if you were to be around when I hunted..." her jaw tightened.

"That would be bad." I guessed.

She answered through her teeth, "Extremely."

I decided to push a little, "Because...?

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, preparing herself to answer. She then opened them and shifted her body toward me, grabbing my hand and looking at me in the eyes.

"When we hunt... we give ourselves to our senses. Governing ourselves less with our minds. We become—for lack of a better word—animalistic. We use mostly our sense of smell. And if you were around when that happens, I don't think I would be able to control myself," she looked unhappy, her sad eyes pierced into mine and I understood the severity of the situation. 

"I understand," I whispered. 

She seemed surprised, but slowly began to smile. Sadness slowly melting away from her face, "So, your drawing," 

I smiled, "I decided to make you wait until it's finished."

She frowned, "I don't like that decision,"

"I'm helping you learn patience," I laughed. 

She shook her head, "I suppose that's a trait I should acquire. You should head inside, Charlie's nearly here,"

I nodded and took my hand back reluctantly. 

"Oh, and Bella?" she called after I pushed the door opened and had stepped out.

"Yeah?" I asked, closing the car door softly.

She was leaning toward me, speaking through the open window, "Tomorrow it's my turn,"

I gave her a questioning look, "Your turn?"

"To ask the questions," she grinned.

And then she was gone, car speeding down the street as I moved up to my front door. Just as I unlocked it, dad's cruiser pulled up behind me. I looked over my shoulder making sure it was him before walking it, leaving the door opened for him. 

I moved to the kitchen and pulled out a water bottle from the fridge. Dad walked in, giving me a questioning look when he saw me chugging down the water with no breaks. He laughed when I held up a finger at him. 

"Thirsty?" 

I finished the water, taking a much-needed exhale, "You have no idea."

I noticed the box of pizza in his hand, I was thankful. I didn't have the brain to cook today. We sat down silently and began eating the plain pizza. 

"So, are you still planning on going to Seattle on Saturday?" he asked after a while.

"Yeah," I replied, taking a sip of my soda. 

"You couldn't find a date to the dance? Are you sure you don't want to go to that?" I felt like he was trying to convince me not to go to another city where he couldn't get to me fast. You know, in case I got hit by another car.

"There's no one I want to go with, besides, dances aren't my thing," 

"You're too much like me sometimes, Bells," he chuckled.

I smiled, "Then I'm doomed, old man,"

We moved to the living room, I worked on homework silently while he watched the game. It was nice to exist with my dad this way. He was barely around when I was growing up, not by choice, I understood that. Though I missed my mom, I preferred living with dad. He had boundaries and was respectful of my space. He didn't push for me to tell him anything and he didn't freak out if I came home limping after an accident during gym. He was more like a roommate, but I knew if I pushed his limits, he wouldn't hesitant to turn into a parental figure and put me in my place. 

After his game, I moved upstairs and worked on my drawing. I wasn't exactly good at art, but I wasn't horrible either. I liked to draw; it was a much-needed stress reliever. Putting everything I felt into a page, that was therapeutic. 

I finished the drawing, finishing the details on the mountains. Drawing the thunderstorm that surrounded the two girls that represented me and Edythe. Lightening moved jaggedly around them, trees and grass catching fire where they hit. When I finished, I colored in everything. The green of the trees and mountains, the different colored wildflowers. The blue lighting that started the blazing fire. Edythe's beautiful bronze hair was hard to perfect, mine was easier. My brown color existed everywhere; her shade of red was special just for her. 

I perfected it and fell asleep, too tired to shower. 

When I woke up, I felt existed. I was still very sleepy, so I showered in cold water. Hoping it would wake me, rather than give me hypothermia. But it only took for the water to hit my skin before I turned it back to hot. Stupid of me that I was the type to actually shower in cold water. Not even in the dead of a Phoenix summer did I do that. 

I got ready fast, moving downstairs to pour myself a cup of coffee. This would do, Cuban coffee could wake a coma patient. I downed the hot beverage and moved to the front door. I peeked out through the small window, making sure Edythe's car was there, my heart thumping when I saw that it was. I breathed in and stepped outside, closing it behind me but not bothering to lock it. I couldn't tell if she was staring at me during my walk to the passenger side of her car. But I could feel her gaze through the tinted windows. 

I opened the door and climbed in, giving her a smile that she returned. 

"Good morning. How are you today?" she looked my face over, I knew the signs that I barely got any sleep were written on my face. Her question was merely common curtesy.

"Good, and you?" I was always good with her around. 

"I'm good too," she smiled, "You look tired."

"I couldn't sleep," I admitted. 

She laughed as she turned the key, the car purring silently to life, "Neither could I,"

"You deserve a good nights rest, dream a little," I said to her, still not over the fact that she couldn't sleep at all.

"You're right, I wouldn't mind sleeping if it meant dreaming of you," 

I blushed, clearing my throat, "So, uhm, what did you do last night?"

"Oh no, today is my day," she laughed.

"Oh right. Okay, shoot, what do you want to know?"

"What's your favorite color?" she was totally serious.

"Hm, it changes. Today it's gold."

Her eyes flashed between me and the road, "Any particular reason why?"

"It's the color of your eyes." 

Her eyes softened when they looked back at me, I smiled shyly back at her. 

"Can I see that drawing now?" she moved on. 

I hesitated before grabbing my bag and pulling out my sketch book, "Don't judge, actually, finish the drive to school. I need your eyes on the road."

She rolled her eyes and was silent the next minute that it took us to get to school, she found the nearest parking, not bothering to take the one next to Rosalie's convertible. 

"Okay, let's see," she said, turning to me. 

I pulled out the page and examined the picture once more before I handed it over with a shaky hand. She took it, her eyes growing wide as soon as they shifted to the page. She looked it over for a few minutes, her eyes growing softer and softer until they moved back to my face. 

"It's beautiful," she whispered, her voice full of admiration. 

I blushed, "Thank you. You can keep it."

She smiled and held it to her chest, "I wasn't planning on giving it back,"

For the rest of the day she kept asking me basic questions. What's your favorite food? What do you miss the most about Phoenix besides the weather? When's your birthday? What's your favorite band? How many bones have you broken?

She was surprised, and a bit skeptical when my answer to that last one was none. I couldn't remember the last time I had been interrogated like this, that's probably because no one had ever been as interested in me as Edythe. It felt nice. The attention from her. The way her eyes opened up with wonder and excitement when she found out a new piece of information about me. 

The bell rang, signaling the end of the lunch hour. 

"Taylor's having jealous thoughts," Edythe said suddenly.

I glanced over to my friends table, they were all standing around ignoring the bell. Taylor was looking at mine and Edythe's way, her face full of anger. 

"Would you like me to handle this?" Edythe asked.

That was the first question she had asked today that left me speechless. 

Then I smirked, "I'd love to see that."

She winked, grabbing my hand and leading me towards my former lunch table. Taylor's eyes widened when she saw us approaching. A few heads turned when we reached Taylor, who's skin was glowing red. 

"May we have a word, Taylor?" Edythe asked politely, before turning toward the crowd of people who had gone quite and were listening in, "Alone,"

Everyone dispersed after that, only Jessica and Lauren remained. Lauren look worried, Jessica was no longer intimidated by Edythe. She was my friend; she would stay for the show.

"Uh... sure, wh—what's up?" Taylor stuttered out.

"I have been made aware that you are under the impression that you're going to take Bella to prom. But you see, Bella will be very busy that night, with me. As a matter of fact, as long as Bella and I are concerned, she will be busy every night." Edythe was respectful in her tone of voice. "Sorry if you allowed yourself to be deluded," 

Taylor and Lauren stood around with their mouths hanging open, Jessica hand was attempting to cover her laughter. Edythe began walking away, pulling my hand but stopped when I didn't move with her. 

"You should go with who you really want," I looked between Taylor and Lauren before letting Edythe pull me away.

I started laughing when we walked out through the lunchroom doors, "That was everything, holy shit,"

She laughed with me through the halls. 

We entered the biology classroom quietly; Mr. Banner was already there. He was ready to play the same movie from yesterday and I knew I was in for another thunderstorm. 

I was proven right when the lights went off. The lighting was back between me and I felt the need to pull her toward me. Burry my face on the spot between her neck and shoulder, kissing it, hand tangled in her hair...taste her lips. All these thoughts were inappropriate for a classroom, they also made the electric tension between us worse. 

The hour dragged on, and we followed the same pattern as yesterday. She walked me to history and picked me up after art. And walked hand in hand to her car, where she continued her interrogation. This time focusing on my music taste and my favorite movies. 

"Are you finished?" I chuckled; we were outside of my house. Had been for a long time now, both her and I were in no rush to leave each other.

"Not even close, but unfortunately I'll have to save it for tomorrow. Your father will be home soon," 

I frowned, dad was home early on Wednesdays, today was Thursday, "How late is it?"

"it's twilight, it's the safest time of day for us. The end of another day, the beginning of another night,"

"I like the night," I stated, before frowning, "Without the dark, we'd never see the stars. Not like you see them much around here. Sky watching was my favorite thing to do most nights in Phoenix, mom and I would go to the middle of the desert in Phil's truck and lay there for hours,"

She smiled at me, eyes soft. 

"So... is it my turn again tomorrow?" I asked.

She feigned outrage, "Absolutely not, I told you I've not finished yet," 

"What else is there?" I sighed.

She flashed her dimpled, "You'll see."

"I don't like that,"

"I'm giving you the chance to practice patience," she teased and I chuckled.

I stared at her for a while, she looked back. Before a look of concern mixed with annoyance flashed across her face.

Her head snapped forward 

"Oh no," she breathed.

"What's wrong?"

"Another complication,"

Her jaw clenched, eyebrows pulled together. She glanced at be before reaching across me and opening the passenger door in one swift movement.

"Hurry," she urged and I stepped out into the light drizzle. 

Just then, headlights illuminated me. Making me squint to see a dark car making it's approach. I could tell it wasn't dad, this car was a beat up white sedan. I closed the door and walked around to the side walk. The sedan's headlights were shinning directly at Edythe, the tint barely doing anything to cover her. she was still looking ahead, and she looked strangely annoyed. She revved the engine and sped away into the night. 

"Hey, Bella," called a familiar voice from the drivers side of the little white car.

"Jacob?" I questioned, squinting through the lights just as dad's cruise swung around the corner. His own headlights shinning a light on the occupants of the sedan.

Jacob was making his way out of the drivers side, his wide grin shining brightly through the night. In the passenger seat, Billy sat. His face was stern and stoic, he was looking straight at me. I lifted a hand, wanting to wave. But the expression in his face stopped me. His eyes were wide with fear... or shock. I couldn't tell. I looked back in confusion. 

Edythe had said "another complication."

The look on Billy's face told me that he had recognized her. And it was clear to me that he believed every legend his son had scoffed at.

Billy Black was the complication.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to finish this as soon as I could. Dealing with school made it difficult but I managed. I hope you guys enjoyed it.


	12. Balancing

"Billy!" dad called as soon as he got out of the car. 

I turned, breaking my gaze away from Billy, and moving up the steps of my house. While dad greeted Jacob.

"I'm going to pretend I didn't see you driving, young man," 

"Charlie, you know we get our permits early on the rez," Jacob said as I opened the front door and flicked on the lights. 

Dad laughed, "I'm also going to pretend that I believe you," 

"How else am I supposed to get around?" Billy said. 

I stepped in further into the house, turning on the lights inside. Hanging my jacket and bag before returning to the porch. I watched anxiously as Jacob and my dad helped Billy out of the car and onto his wheelchair. 

I started chewing my nails as they hurried in, I followed after, closing the door behind me. 

"I didn't know you were coming over," dad said as he pulled off his jacket.

"I hope it's not a bad time," Billy answered, his warm brown eyes flashing to me with an unreadable expression. 

"No it's great, are you staying for the game?"

Jacob grinned, "That was the plan, our TV just broke."

Billy rolled his eyes at her, "Not to mention Jacob needed an excuse to see Bella. I suspect he was the one who broke it,"

Jacob stared at his father with wide eyes. 

I cleared by throat, Billy's scrutinizing gaze was making me uncomfortable so I turned towards the kitchen, "Are you hungry?"

"No, we just ate, thank you," Jacob replied.

"Dad? What about you?" I called over my shoulder as I made my escape around the corner. 

"Sure," he answered, his voice sounded farther away. I heard the TV turn on a second later, letting me know that he had retreated to the living room. 

It was too late to cook, so dad and I would have to settle for a few grilled cheeses.

"Hey, how's it going?" he asked. 

"Good, what about you?" I smiled at him. 

"Eh, I'm having trouble finishing my car, we borrowed that one. You don't happen to know where I can find a master cylinder, do you," 

I gave him a blank stare and he laughed, "I didn't think so. What's wrong with the truck? Do you need a mechanic? I'm pretty good,"

"No,"

"I was just curious, you weren't driving it..." 

I turned the stove on, placing a pan on top of the fire and adding butter. "I got a ride with a friend,"

"That was one beautiful car I could only dream of. Don't blame you for ditching the truck for a chance to ride in that. Though I didn't recognize the driver, I thought I knew everyone around here,"

I nodded, dropping the two sandwiches I had put together on the pan, "Jacob could you hand me two plates? They're in the cupboard over the sink,"

"Sure," 

He got the plates silently as I flipped the sandwiches. I hoped he would drop the subject.

"So, who was it?" he asked, setting the plates down on the counter next to me.

I sighed, defeated, "Edythe Cullen,"

He laughed, and I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion. 

"That explains my dad's weird behavior," 

I nodded, "Oh I forgot that he doesn't like the Cullen's," 

It was a lie, but he believed it, "He needs to chill a little,"

I pursed my lips, "Um, you don't think he would say anything to my dad?"

He looked at me, "I doubt it. Why? Does Charlie not know your friends with her... or more than friends...?"

I wasn't really prepared for his questions, so I didn't really know how to answer. So I lied. 

"She's just a friend," 

I didn't like the look of relief in his face. I was aware that Jacob had somewhat of a crush on me, but I couldn't think of him as more than a friend. And we were barely even that given how little we saw or spoke to each other. Not to mention I was blessed by being born with no attraction to boys whatsoever.

The subject was dropped, and I moved the sandwiches to their plates before heading to the living room with Jacob in tow. I handed a plate to dad and moved upstairs with my own, Jacob following along with me. I didn't really care if Billy said anything to my dad. But I also didn't want him to know either, for right now I was enjoying my little bubble I had with Edythe. 

"So, are you and your friends planning to come down to the beach anytime soon?" Jacob asked as we walked through my door. 

"I'm not really sure. There are no plans as far as I'm aware," I sat down on my desk, pulling out the homework I had to get done.

"It's okay if I'm here right? I don't really want to hang out with our dads," he asked shyly.

I looked at him as I took a bite of my food, he was standing awkwardly in the middle of my room, "Of course, you can sit, you know. I just have to get some work done,"

He smiled and took a sit at the edge of my bed and I looked back to the trig problems I was starting on. 

"I could help, if you need help," he said after a few minutes of silence. 

I laughed, "Sure, give this a go," 

I handed him my worksheet and he took a look, "Hmm, what language is this?"

"Trigonometry," 

He laughed, "Does your school hate you?"

"I'm starting to think so," I took the sheet back from him. 

"Oh, this is cool," I guess I wasn't going to be getting any work done. 

"Hm?"

I looked at him and he was holding the book I had bought in Port Angeles. I had forgotten all about it, it wasn't important anymore after the events that had taken place that night.

"The Mythical Creatures Bible," he read out loud, "Okay, I'm sold. Do your homework, I'll be reading this,"

I smiled and turned back to my work. Jacob didn't take much after that, I kept hearing pages turning and little snickers and quite comments. We were like that for the next hour.

"You know," I jumped at the sound of his voice. "I wouldn't mind if I turned into a wolf every full moon. It sounds liberating, like, running through the dark forest as a majestic creature and worshipping the moon sounds like my kind of shit," 

"The moon is worthy of worship," I agreed, "but she's rarely seen around here,"

"She?" he laughed.

"Yeah. Everyone knows that the moon is a she and that she is gay,"

"Is the sun her lover?" 

"Of course, sad they don't get to be near each other. Though, the sun makes sure to illuminate the moon with her love,"

"So, who's the moon and who's the sun when it comes to you and Edythe?" 

Jacob managed to surprise me, and he laughed at the look on my face. 

"Like I said Bella, I know most people around here. I'm actually happy for you, though I guess I'll have to find a way to get over my embarrassing crush on you," 

"I—"

"Jacob! Time to go!" Billy's voice made me jump. 

Jacob got up, "Well, we'll talk about celestial objects another time then," 

"So, you just come, fuck with my head and then leave?" I laugh. 

"Yup," he winked from the door, "See you around, sun," 

I laughed and got up to follow him. 

"Come up for the next game," dad was saying when we got downstairs.

"Sure, sure. I'll be here. Have a goodnight." Billy's eyes turned my way, his expression turning a lot more serious, "You take care, Bella,"

"Thanks, you too Billy," I muttered, looking away.

I headed for the kitchen, placing my plate in the sink before grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge.

I heard the door close and dads footsteps getting closer.

"Hey, Bells. Seattle plans still in play?" he asked when he walked through the kitchen door.

"Yes," I nodded, I never really understood the point of asking the same questions over and over again. If things change, I'll tell you.

"Good, I've made plans to go fishing with some guys at the station. The weathers supposed to be warm. Let me know if anything changes, I'll stay home with you. I don't want to leave you alone too much," 

"Dad, don't worry about that." I smiled, bringing in for a hug. 

I slept peacefully and dreamlessly that night. I woke to a beautifully gray morning; it was crazy how much I was starting to love the endlessly cloudy weather of Forks. I knew it had something to do with a certain golden-eyed girl. I breezed through my morning routine and hurried downstairs. Dad was in the kitchen drinking his morning coffee, I poured myself a cup and sat with him.

"You're up early," he commented.

I shrugged, "I slept good last night,"

We stalked for a few minutes before he up and left, kissing the top of my head as a goodbye. I smiled and waited a few minutes until I was sure he was gone before I rushed to the door, as soon as I opened it Edythe was already there, waiting for me. 

As soon as I climbed into the passenger seat she flashed her dimples at me, "Hello. How was your sleep?"

"Excellent, how was your night?" I smiled.

"Pleasant," she answered as she pulled away. 

"Can I ask what you did?"

She laughed, "No, today is still mine,"

Today her questions centered around people. She wanted to know about my mom and dad, their past together and what caused them to break up. She wanted to know about the one grandmother I got to meet, what she was like. She asked about old friends from Phoenix who I have neglected and ignored since moving here. And she wanted to know about girls I had dated. 

I blushed, "I never really had a girlfriend. I had one boyfriend before, he was the whole reason for my gay awakening. Our friends pushed us to go out, I never met anyone I had wanted more than you,"

She smiled shyly at me.

We were in the lunchroom at this point. The day had gone by faster than I'd realized. 

"I should've let you drive today," she said suddenly.

I turn my head sideways, "why?"

"I'm leaving with Archie today after lunch,"

"Oh," I blinked, "That's okay, I'm sure I can catch a ride,"

She frowned at me, looking unimpressed, "Don't worry about that, we'll go get your truck and have it waiting for you,"

"That could work if I knew where my key was," I sighed.

"Your truck will be here, and the key will be in the ignition,"

"Okay," I said skeptically, I was almost certain my keys were in the pocket of one of my jackets. Which one I didn't know, even if she broke into my house, I doubt she would find it. but then again, this girl never ceases to amaze me. She smirked, sensing the challenge in my consent. 

"So, where are you going?"

"Hunting," she answered grimly. "If I'm going to be alone with your tomorrow, I'm going to have to take precautions." She looked sad by the time she finished, "You can always cancel, you know?"

I looked away from her persuasive gaze, there was no way she was going to talk me out of having a full day to be with her. "no," I whispered, "I can't," it's too late.

"Perhaps you're right," she murmured.

I looked back at her, her eyes seemed to grow darker. "What time tomorrow?"

"It's a Saturday, so, I suppose you want to sleep in?" she asked.

"No, I don't," I answered too fast and she chuckled.

"Same time as usual, then?" 

I nodded, "Sure, where do I pick you up?"

"I'll meet you at your house,"

"I don't want to leave dad scratching his head at the unexplained Porche in his driveway,"

She grinned, "I wasn't intending on driving."

"Then how—"

"I'll be there, bright and early, no car for Charlie to be confused about." Her voice dropped, and her frown returned, "and if you disappear, it'll be a complete mystery,"

"Perfect, I've always wanted to be on the news," I teased. 

She wasn't amused, but I ignored her scowl and took a sip of my water, "So... what are you hunting tonight? Lions? Tigers? Bears? Have you ever eaten a sea lion? Or a shark? Dolphin?"

She blinked at me before braking into a fit of laughter, "No we don't hunt aquatic creatures. We'll have whatever is at the park, we won't be straying too far away."

"And why are you going with Archie alone?"

She frowned, "He's the most... supportive..."

"And the rest of them? What are they?" I asked curiously.

Her eyebrows came together, "The others are... incredulous, for the most part,"

I allowed myself to sneak a glance over at her siblings. They sat around looking off in different directions. It was exactly like the first time I had seen them, except this time there were only four, I had taken their bronze haired sister and made her mine for the hour.

"They don't like me?" I asked.

"No, Bella, that's not it. They just don't get my infatuation with you,"

"Honestly, me, either," I sighed.

She smiled, "You're different from anyone I've ever met, Bella... human or otherwise,"

"I can say the same about you, but I still don't understand you," I smiled back at her shyly.

"I'll try to explain," she said, grabbing my hand, "Having the advantage of hearing what people are thinking gives me a better than average grasp of human nature. People are predictable, but you... you never do what I expect. I'm always taken by surprise by you."

I looked away, my eyes finding her siblings again. Her word made me feel like a scientific experiment, I didn't like it. But I allowed her to continue, "but there's also another part to it, a part that's harder to explain. It's not easy to put into words—"

I was still looking absentmindedly at the Cullen's while she spoke. When suddenly Rosalie turned his head to look at me. Well, more like glare. Her dark icy eyes poured into mind and I was too stubborn to look away. I raised an eyebrow at her—challenging her. Edythe broke off mid-sentence and made and angry noise under her breath—a fucking hiss. 

Rosalie looked away and I was free. I looked back at Edythe, "Yeah, I'm going to assume that vampire barbie doesn't like me."

"I'm sorry. She's just worried. You see... it's dangerous for them too if after spending so much time with you so publicly...." She trailed off, looking down at our hands. 

"If?"

"If it ends badly," she finished, still looking down.

"Okay, first of all look at me," she looked up, pain was evident in her eyes. "I trust you with my life. Which you have saved more than once already, by the way. You don't have to feel this way, negative thoughts bring on negative actions, that goes for you" I stopped look back at Rosalie who ignored me, "and your bitch of a sister, who doesn't know me and therefore should mind her own fucking business,"

Rosalie stood up, bringing her hands down on the table as she looked across the room at me. Her face was livid, Emmett was up in a flash, holding her waist. His face was amused as he spoke to her. Archie got up too, he seemed to be telling Rosalie off. Jasper watched, in amusement for a minute, before everyone seemed to settle back down. 

Edythe laughed, "Trust you to piss off a moody vampire like my sister," 

"Yeah well, she sounds like she's dragging the whole situation," 

Edythe looked at me in what I assumed was admiration, "thank you,"

I smiled, "what for?"

"Your words,"

Before I could reply, someone appeared behind her and I jumped. Nearly falling backwards in my seat, Edythe's grasp on my hand saved me. "Shit,"

Archie towered over Edythe; his eyes were full of playful amusement. This was the first time I looked at his features; from the black ink color of his eyes, to the light shadow of hair on his scalp. 

"Archie," Edythe greeted him without looking away, "Stop scaring Bella, please."

"Edythe," he nodded, "I didn't mean to give her a fright,"

She smiled, "I'm sure you knew you would though. I suppose an actual introduction is in order. Bella, Archie—Archie, Bella,"

"Hello, Bella." His eyes glittered like black diamonds, his smile was friendly, "It's nice to finally meet you,"

Edythe flashed a dark look at him, I almost missed it. 

"You too Archie, um, you're really tall." I stare through wide eyes. 

They both chuckled.

"are you ready?" he asked her. 

"Nearly, I'll meet you at the car," she replied.

He left; his movement were so fluid it made me think of a dancer. It wasn't human-like at all to walk that way. They were all horrible at acting human.

"So, should I say, 'have fun' or...?"

She shrugged, "Have fun works,"

"Have fun, then,"

"I'll try, and you have to try to stay safe,"

I sighed, shaking my head, "You nearly get squished by one van and all of a sudden people think you're going to die at any moment."

"No. The fact that you've attracted multiple threats on your life the last few weeks makes people think you're a hazard to yourself."

"Okay, true. I promise to try not to die in a freak accident while you're gone," I smiled widely. 

She laughed and stood up, "Good,"

I stood up after her, sighing, "I'll see you tomorrow,"

She smiled sadly, "It seems like a long time to you, doesn't it?"

I nodded. 

"For me as well,"

She gave my hand alight squeeze before she turned and left. I watched her walk away until she was out of my sight. 

There were still about ten minutes left of the lunch hour, so I decided to go to my old lunch table. Though I've stopped sitting there a few days ago it felt more like months. I felt awkward as I neared my friends.

"Hey, Bella," Jessica greeted me, I sat next to her. "I was just thinking of you, I wanted to know if you and Edythe are going to the dance together tomorrow, or is the Seattle thing you told me about still happening?"

"Oh, no, I don't do dances," I replied, grabbing a chip from the bag Angela was offering to me. 

"So, Seattle then?"

I nodded, "Yeah,"

Jessica's face lit up, "I'm going to need details after, you should kiss her!" 

I blushed, "Yeah, okay, as if," 

The bell rang and we all disbursed, it was a long few hours. I missed Edythe and my mood kept dropping every time I remembered that I wouldn't be seeing her after school. But I made it through.

When I got to the parking lot I looked around and was amazed to see that my truck was parked exactly where Edythe had parked her own car this morning. 

I grinned shaking my head as I headed toward it and climbed in. A small piece of paper sat on the seat, catching my eye. I grabbed it and read the two words written in Edythe's fancy calligraphy handwriting.

I smiled and put it away in my pocket. When I turned the key in the ignition, the roar of the truck coming to life made me jump. I laughed, looking around to check if I had any witnesses. 

When I got home my front door was locked. So was the back door. I moved to the entryway; where my jackets hung. Everything was in order, there were no signs of anyone ever being here. I wondered how Edythe and Archie were able to find my key without making any disturbances. 

"Are you okay dad?" I asked him at diner.

He nodded, "yeah, just something at work has me worried,"

"What's wrong?" 

He took a bite of his lasagna and shook his head, "I don't need you worrying about it too, Bells," 

I let the subject drop, "okay, dad. But don't stress yourself out too much either,"

As I laid in bed that night, I began to worry about what Edythe had said. If this, what this was that we had, ended badly she—and her family—would be in danger of being found out. She was risking exposure by being alone with me, the blood in my veins were a threat to her and a danger to my life. Though I understood that was her nature, just like it's in my own human nature to eat meat. I was part of the food chain that she relied on to stay alive. In a way, that scared me, but I wasn't willing to let her go. The risk was worth it, she was worth it.

I started feeling protective of her as I came to terms with the fact that she was risking more than her own safety. And her safety was the only thing that was important to me. Should I tell dad that I decided against going to Seattle? Call up Jessica and pretend to cry to her that Edythe canceled? She would spread the word around the people who had overheard us at lunch. All this would keep Edythe safe, just in case it ended badly. And if it did end badly, the less people that knew about me and Edythe the better it would be for her and her family if I... vanished? Would the police find a part of me? I wasn't exactly sure. 

I shuddered and turned on my side. 

Every time I close my eyes, I saw Edythe's pained gaze. I saw the dark glare of Rosalie's eyes, Emmett's steel-like muscles, Archie's black diamond eyes... and Jasper, who—for some reason unknown to me—was the most frightening of them all. They were all frightening, they were all supernatural and I knew they would be fine whatever the outcome may be. I knew she would be fine. 

The next morning I was up early, but I still breezed through my morning routine after checking if my dad was gone. I felt anxious but excited. I decided against dressing in layers, I was promised the weather would be warm so I would wear a short sleeve shirt. But I would also take a sweater or flannel just in case. I still had trust issues when it came to the weather.

I was sipping on coffee when a light knock sounded from the door. My heart rate picked up and I moved quickly and opened the door. There she was. 

I took a breath, "Hi,"

At first, she was serious, then she took a look at me and laughed. 

"Good morning," she said, chuckling.

"What's funny?" I laughed lightly. 

"We match," 

She had on a white shirt underneath her burgundy sweater, and black jeans. I had a white t-shirt on, with black jeans. We were wearing the exact same outfit, just a few minor details. Even our boots were the same, though hers were clearly designer and much more expensive looking than my old beat up ones. 

"Oh, this is cute of us," I grinned. 

She winked. 

I finished the last of my coffee and set the mug on the table next to the door, I'll get it later. I grabbed a flannel, I slipped it on and grabbed my bag before stepping out onto the porch and locking the door behind me as Edythe walked to my truck. 

I walked down, nearly laughing at the martyred expression on her face.

"You agreed to this," I reminded her as I opened the passenger door for her. 

She rolled her eyes as she got in.

I got in on the driver's side, cringing as the engine roared to life. 

"Where to?" I asked. 

"First, put your seatbelt on. I'm nervous already."

I rolled my eyes as I followed her orders, then waited for her directions. 

"Take the one-oh-one north." She said.

It was hard to concentrate on driving with her so close to me. I was more aware of both her and I as I drove carefully through the sleeping town. 

"Bella, I don't think we're going to make it out of Forks before nightfall," she joked.

"Excuse you, don't hate the truck. It's old enough to be your Porche's grandfather, respect your elders," 

Despite Edythe's pessimism, we were soon out of the towns limits. Houses and lawns were replaced by the dense forest.

I began to ask for more directions, but she was ahead of me already.

"Turn right on the one-oh-one," I silently obeyed her instructions.

"And now we drive until the street ends."

I could hear a smile in her voice, but for our safety—mine and the trucks, that is—I resisted the urge to look over at her. 

"And what's at the end of the street?" I asked curiously.

"A trail."

"We're hiking?" 

"Is that a problem?"

"No..." I was going to fall so much.

"Don't worry. It's just five miles or so and we're in no hurry,"

Oh god, so many accidents could happen in one mile let alone five of them. I didn't reply, I didn't want to make her aware of how much I was really panicking on the inside. 

It's fine. I'll be fine.

We drove in silence for a while. I was trying to picture her expression when I fell for the millionth time within ten seconds.

"What are you thinking?" she suddenly asked, curiosity laced her words.

"Just imagining your face when I fall a million times in the pan of a few seconds," I replied, shrugging. 

She laughed, "Don't worry, I'll be there to catch you before you fall."

I nodded, "I believe you. Where are we going?"

"Just a place I like to go whenever the weather is nice," 

We both glanced out the window at the thinning clouds. Patches of blue where beginning to appear but the sun was still missing. 

The road suddenly came to an end, a wooden marker pointed to the thin foot trail that lead into the thick forest. I parked on the narrow shoulder and stepped out. It was warmer now enough for me to pull off my flannel and tie it around my waist. It wouldn't be needed with the five miles of hiking ahead of us. 

I heard Edythe's door slam shut and looked over to see that she had taken off her own sweater, wearing only a thin tank top now, and had tied her hair back in a knot. I admired the perfect spiral curls that spilled out. She faced away from me, gazing off into the forest. 

I could see the delicate shapes of her shoulder blades almost like furled wings underneath her pale skin. Her arms looked harmless; it was hard to believe they contained the strength I had seen in them before. 

"This way," she said, glancing over her shoulder at me before moving forward into the dark forest. 

"What about the trail?" I asked, as I hurried around the truck to catch up to her.

"We're not taking the trail,"

"Oh god,"

She laughed once and turned, showing me a mocking half smile, and I couldn't breathe. 

Not just the smile; I had never seen so much of her skin before. Her pale arms and shoulder, her delicate collarbones—that I wanted to kiss—the vulnerable hollows above them, the swanlike column of her neck, and the gentle swell of her breasts—oh, god, don't stare, don't stare. She was impossibly perfect. How could this goddess ever be mine?

She stared at me, shock by my tortured expression. 

"Do you want to go home?" she quietly asked, her voice saturated with sadness.

"No, no. I'm ready," 

I walked forward until I was nearly chest to chest with her. 

"What's wrong?" she asked softly.

"I'm a slow hiker, actually, I've never really hiked before. So, please be patient."

She grinned, holding my gaze, "I can be patient."

I knew she was trying to pull me out of my glum mood, it made me smile.

"Okay, so lead the way. We have to hack down five miles of jungle before sundown,"

Her eyebrows pulled together at the hint of annoyance in my voice, but she still turned and began leading the way.

I was surprised to find that is wasn't as challenging as I thought it would be. The way was mostly flat, and she seemed to be content going at my pace. I tripped over the roots a total of three times, each time she was there to catch my elbow and steady me before I could fall. Each time she did my heart sped up in my chest and after the second time I saw the look of concern in her face and I was sure she could hear it. 

We walked mostly in silence. When we did talk it was me answering her questions. Today she focused on my childhood, birthdays, favorite teacher growing up, least favorite and childhood pets. I sadly confessed that I always wanted a dog but I was allergic, so then we got a cat and that was how my mother found out she was allergic to them. That led us to get goldfish, which, after killing three in a row, I'd given up on getting pets. It was too painful. She laughed louder than usual at that, the bell-like echoes bounced back to me from the trees. 

It took half of the morning to hike through the woods, she never seemed impatient at my slow pace. The forest spread out around us in a high labyrinth of trees. I started to get nervous that I was now going to have to reside here due to us not being able to find our way back. But Edythe's confidence steps through the forest calmed me.

After several hours, the green light that filtered down through the canopy brightened into yellow. Excitement washed through me; the sun was finally out. 

"Are we there yet?" I asked, taking a sip of the water bottle I had remembered to bring. 

She smiled at the change in my mood, "Nearly. Do you see the clearer light ahead?" 

I shoved the bottle back in my bag as I answered, "No, should I?"

"Hmm, maybe it's too soon for your eyes,"

"Time to visit the optometrist," I sighed dramatically and she grinned. 

It was only after a few yards that I could see a brighter spot in the trees ahead, a yellow-white glow instead of the yellow-green glow that came down from above. I picked up my pace, and she let me lead now, following noiselessly. 

I reached the edge of the pool of light and stepped through the last fringe of ferns into the most beautiful place I had ever seen in my life. 

It was a small, circular meadow that was filled with beautiful wildflowers of every color. Somewhere nearby, I could hear the rush of a stream. The sun was directly overhead, filling the meadow with a haze of buttery sunshine. I moved slowly through the soft grass, carefully stepping around the dancing flowers, taking in the warm, gilded air. I admired the beautiful scenery before me for another minute before I turned. I expected Edythe to be right behind me but she was nowhere to be found. I spun around, eyes searching for her. Finally, I found her under the dense shade of the canopy at the edge of the hollow, watching me with cautious eyes. And suddenly I remembered why we were here. 

To finally solve the mystery of Edythe and the sun. 

I stepped back, stretching my hand toward her. Her wary eyes were reluctant. It looked oddly like stage fright to me, so I smiled encouragingly and begave walking back to her. She held up a warning hand and I stopped and waited for her. 

Edythe took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and then stepped out into the bright glare of the midday sun.


	13. Confessions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, the meadow scene. So iconic, I barely changed a thing. But I also did change a few things. In the process I discovered that SMeyer doesn’t know how to write a realistic kiss. So, I fixed it.

With closed eyes, Edythe stepped into the light. 

My heart stopped and restarted within just a second and suddenly I was sprinting toward her. 

"Edythe!" 

It wasn't until her golden eyes opened in a flash and I got close enough to register what I was seeing to understand that she hadn't caught on fire. Her hands went up in a flash, her palms facing me, and I stumbled into a stop. My knees buckled and threatened to give out beneath me. 

The light blazed off her skin, dancing in prism-like rainbows across every part of her skin that was being kissed by the sun. I had to squint through the bright light bouncing off her. It was like looking into the sun itself. 

A part of my brain screamed for me to get on my knees and bow at the impossible beauty in front of me. This is the type of goddess people worshipped. The kind you build temples for and offered sacrifices to. How was a mere mortal like me in the presence of such an angel?

I shook that part of my brain away. We were equals, no matter how much she resembled a goddess. I looked past her luminosity to see the expression on her face. She was watching me through wide eyes—fear was present in them. I took a step forward and she slightly cringed away. 

"Does—does that... hurt you?" I whispered through my breathlessness. 

"No," she whispered back. 

I subconsciously took a step toward her again—she was the magnet, I was the helpless piece of metal. She let her warning hand drop to her side. As she moved, the rainbow sparks shimmered down her arms. Slowly, I began to move around her, avoiding getting any closer but letting my eyes take her in from new angles. I needed my brain to absorb this, I needed it to believe that she was real and not just an illusion. 

My eyes were wide with wonder as I took her in, she had her arms crossed and was looking nervously at me. She seemed self-conscious and unsure. I didn't it, it was like she thought I was going run away screaming looking for that angry mob. 

I finished my circle and then closed the last few feet holding us apart. 

"Edythe," I breathed. 

"Are you scared now?" she whispered sadly, eyes looking down.

"No." 

Her eyes snapped up. Confusion played in them as she looked into my eyes. Trying to hear what I was thinking. 

I reached toward her slowly, searching her face for permission. Her eyes opened wider, and she froze. Carefully, slowly, I allowed my fingertips to graze the glistening skin on the back of her arm. I was surprised to find it was as cold as I remembered, the sun not having any affect on the temperature of her skin. While my fingers touched her, the reflections of the rainbows in her skin bounced onto my own and I was in awe again.

"What are you thinking?" she asked, her voice still a whisper. 

I struggled to find words, "I..." I took a deep breath, and the words finally came. "I never imagined something so beautiful—and let's be honest gay—could exist... I mean, you're full of tiny rainbows!" 

She chuckled slightly, then the wariness in her eyes returned. Like she thought I was saying what I thought she wanted to hear. But truer words have never been spoken. It was purely uncensored, straight from brain to mouth. I had no filter right now, not when I was so overwhelmed with emotion and wonder. 

She started to lift her arm, then dropped it. Making the shimmer flare. "It's very strange, though," she murmured. 

"Amazing," I disagreed. 

"Aren't you even a little bit repulsed by my blatant lack of humanity?"

I shook my head, "No, Edythe," 

Her eyes narrowed, "You should be."

"But, I'm not, Edythe," 

She pulled her arm away from under my fingertips and folded it behind her back. Rather than follow her cue, I took half a step toward her, feeling the reflective shine on my face. 

And then, she was suddenly ten feet away from me, her warning hand up again and her jaw clenched.

"Sorry," I said.

"Just give me a minute," she told me. 

"I'll be more careful," 

She nodded, then walked to the middle of the meadow, creating an arc when she passed me, keeping those ten feet between us. She sat down with her back to me, the sunlight incandescent across her shoulder blades, reminding me of wings. I took a breath and began to walk slowly closer, and then I sat down facing her when I was about five feet away. 

"Is this alright?"

She nodded, though there was still a look of uncertainty on her face, "Just let me... concentrate."

I sat silently. After a few seconds, she shut her eyes again. That was fine with me, I just wanted to admire her seeing her like this; her truest self. 

Minutes passed by and she laid back down on the grass with one hand behind her head. The tall grass partially obscured my view of her and I slightly frowned.

"Can I...?" I asked, trailing off.

She patted the space next to her. 

I moved a few feet closer, then another foot when she didn't object... another few inches. 

Her eyes were still closed, lids glistening pale lavender over the dark fan of her lashes. Her chest rose and fell evenly, almost like she was asleep, except there was a sense of effort and control in her movements. Like she was very aware of her breathing. 

I sat with my legs folder beneath me, my elbows on my knees and my chin resting on my hands. It was very warm—the sun felt strange on my skin now that I was so used to the cloudy weather— and the meadow had become the background now. Still beautiful but not as beautiful as the creature in front of me. 

Her lips began to move, the light flittered off them and they... trembled. I though she might have spoken but the words were too quiet, and too fast.

"Are you... did you say something?" I whispered; I didn't want to be too loud. the silence was comforting in this moment.

"I'm just singing to myself... it calms me." she murmured.

I was suddenly thankful my ears couldn't register her singing voice. It would've been too much for my senses. 

We didn't move for a long time. An hour might've passed, maybe more. And as the minutes passed, the tension that I hadn't totally processed in the beginning drained quietly away, and everything became so peaceful that I was almost sleepy. 

Every time that I shifted my weight. I ended up another half-inch closer to her. I leaned closer, studying her delicate hand, trying find the facets in her smooth skin. Without even thinking about, I reached out with one curious finger and stroked the back of her hand. Awed by the satin-like smoothness in her skin. I felt her eyes on me and I looked up, my finger freezing on her cool skin. 

Her peaceful eyes watched me, her lips were turned upward into a smile and those dimples I loved so much were greeting me. 

"I still don't scare you, do I?" 

I laughed, shaking my head, "No, sorry. You're more than welcomed to try again."

She smiled wider, I inched closer.

My trembling fingers moved and traced the shape of her forearm with my fingertips. Her eyes closed again, still smiling. 

"Do you mind?" I asked. 

"No. You can't imagine how that feels."

I lightly trailed my hand over the delicate structure of her arm, following the faint pattern of blue-ish veins inside the crease of her elbow. I reached to turn her hand over, and when she realized what I wanted, she flipped her palm up in a movement so fast it didn't exist to my eyes. My fingers froze.

"Sorry," she murmured, and then smiled. Her eyes slid closed again. "It's too easy to be myself with you."

I lifted her hand, moving it slowly back and forth as I watched the sun dance in rainbows across her palm. I held it closer to my face, trying again to figure out the science behind this phenomenon. 

"Tell me what you're thinking," she whispered. 

I looked back to her face, she was watching me again, her eyes were the lightest I'd ever seen them. Pale honey. "It's still so strange for me, not knowing."

"The rest of us feel that way all the time, you know." I chuckled. 

"It's a hard life," she said, and there was a melancholy note in her tone. "But you didn't tell me."

"I was wishing I could know what you were thinking...."

"And?"

"I was wishing that I could believe that you were real. I'm afraid...."

"I don't want you to be afraid." Her voice was just a low murmur, the sadness in her voice deepened. We both heard what she hadn't said—that I didn't need to be afraid, that there was nothing to fear.

"That's not the kind of fear I meant."

So quickly that my eyes missed the movement again, she was half-sitting, propped up on her right arm, her left palm still in my hands. Her gorgeous face was only a few inches from mine. I should have leaned away. I was supposed to be careful. But I was trapped. 

Her honey eyes burned with curiosity. 

"Then what are you afraid of?" she whispered.

I couldn't answer. I smelled her sweet, cool breath in my face, and I was done for. Unthinkingly, I leaned closer, inhaling.

And then she was gone, her hand ripped from mine so fast that they stung. In the time it took my eyes to focus, she was twenty feet away, standing at the edge of the small meadow, deep in the shade of a huge fir tree. She stared at me, eyes dark in the shadows, her expression unreadable.

I could feel the shock on my face, and my hands burned.

"Edythe. I'm... sorry." My voice was just a whisper, but I knew she could hear me.

"Give me a moment," she called, just loud enough for my less sensitive ears.

I sat very still.

After ten very long seconds, she walked back, slowly for her. She stopped when she was still several feet away and sank gracefully to the ground, crossing her legs underneath her. Her eyes never left mine. She took two deep breaths, then smiled apologetically.

"I am so very sorry." She hesitated. "Would you understand what I meant if I said I was only human?"

I nodded, not quite able to smile at her joke. Adrenaline pushed through my system as I realized what had almost happened. She could smell that from where she sat. Her smile turned mocking.

"I'm the world's best predator, aren't I? Everything about me invites you in—my voice, my face, even my smell. As if I needed any of that!"

Suddenly she was just a blur. I blinked and she'd vanished; then she was standing beneath the same tree as before, having circled the entire meadow in a fraction of a second.

"As if you could outrun me," she said bitterly.

She leaped a dozen feet straight up, grabbing a two-foot-thick branch and wrenching it away from the trunk without any sign of effort. She was back on the ground in the same instant, balancing the huge, gnarled lance in one hand for just a second. Then with blinding speed she swung it—one-handed—like a bat at the tree she'd ripped it from.

With an explosive boom, both the branch and the tree shattered in half.

Before I even had time to shy away from the detonation, before the tree could even fall to the ground, she was right in front of me again, just two feet away, still as a sculpture.

"As if you could fight me off," she said gently. Behind her, the sound of the tree crashing to the earth echoed through the forest.

I'd never seen her so completely freed of her careful human façade. She'd never been less human... or more beautiful. I couldn't move, I was trapped. She was indeed a predator, and I was the helpless prey. 

Her eyes seemed to glow with excitement. Then, as the seconds passed, they dimmed. Her expression slowly folded into a mask of sadness. She looked like she was about to cry, and I struggled up to my knees, one hand reaching toward her.

She held out her hand, cautioning me. "Wait."

I stopped, waiting patiently for her. 

She took one step toward me. "Don't be afraid," she murmured, and her velvet voice was unintentionally seductive. "I promise..." She hesitated. "I swear I will not hurt you." She seemed like she was trying to convince herself just as much as she was trying to convince me.

"You don't have to be afraid," she whispered again as she stepped closer with exaggerated slowness. She stopped just a foot away and gently touched her hand to the one I still had stretched toward her. I wrapped mine around hers tightly.

"Please forgive me," she said in a formal tone. "I can control myself. You caught me off guard. I'm on my best behavior now."

She waited for me to respond, but I just knelt there in front of her, staring, my brain taking it last time to start working. 

"I'm not thirsty today, honestly." She winked.

That made me laugh, though my laugh sounded a little winded.

"Are you all right?" she asked, reaching out—slowly, carefully—to put her other hand on top of mine.

I looked at her smooth, marble hand, and then at her eyes. They were soft, repentant, but I could see some of the sadness still in them.

I smiled up at her so widely that my cheeks hurt. Her answering smile was dazzling.

With a deliberately unhurried, sinuous movement, she sank down, curling her legs beneath her. Awkwardly I copied her, till we were sitting facing each other, knees touching, our hands still wrapped together between us.

"So where were we, before. . ."

I grinned, "before your dramatic tantrum? I honestly have no idea."

She laughed, but her face was ashamed. "I think we were talking about why you were afraid, besides the obvious reason."

"Oh, right."

"Well?"

I looked down at our hands, turning mine so that the light would glisten across hers.

"How easily frustrated I am," she sighed.

I looked into her eyes, suddenly realizing that this was every bit as new to her as it was to me. However many years of experience she'd had before we'd met, this was hard for her, too. That made me braver.

"Well, first of all, I'm not afraid of you. I'm only afraid of losing."

"You should know being with me have never been in your best interest."

I frowned.

"I should have left that first day and not come back. I should leave now." She shook her head. "I might have been able to do it then. I don't know how to do it now."

"Good, don't try it. . . Please."

Her face turned brittle. "Don't worry. I'm essentially a selfish creature. I crave your company too much to do what I should."

I smiled, "Good. Because you're what I want, too."

She looked sadly back at me, "Bella... you should never forget that it's not only your company I crave. Never forget that I am more dangerous to you than I am to anyone or anything else." 

She stared unseeingly into the forest.

I thought for a moment.

"I don't think I understand exactly what you mean by that last part."

She looked back and smiled at me, but even her dimples couldn't hide the sadness in her eyes. 

"How do I explain? And without horrifying you?"

She looked at our hands.

"That's amazingly pleasant, your warmth."

A moment passed while she seemed to be arranging her thoughts.

"You know how everyone enjoys different flavors?" she began. "Some people love chocolate ice cream, others prefer strawberry?"

I nodded.

"I apologize for the food analogy—I couldn't think of another way to explain."

I grinned and she grinned back, but her smile was rueful.

"You see, every person has their own scent, their own essence.... If you locked an alcoholic in a room full of stale beer, she'd drink it. But she could resist, if she wished to, if she were a recovering alcoholic. Now let's say you placed in that room a glass of hundred-year-old brandy, the rarest, finest cognac—and filled the room with its warm aroma—how do you think our alcoholic would fare then?"

We sat in silence for a minute, staring into each other's eyes, trying to read each other's thoughts.

She broke the silence first.

"Maybe that's not the right comparison. Maybe it would be too easy to turn down the brandy. Perhaps I should have made our alcoholic a heroin addict instead."

"So what you're saying is, I'm your brand of heroin?" I teased, trying to lighten the mood.

She smiled swiftly, seeming to appreciate my effort. "Yes, you are exactly my brand of heroin."

"Does that happen often?" I asked.

She looked across the treetops, thinking through her response.

"I spoke to my siblings about it." She still stared into the distance. "To Jasper, every one of you is much the same. He's the most recent to join our family. It's a struggle for him to abstain at all. He hasn't had time to grow sensitive to the differences in smell, in flavor." She glanced swiftly at me. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine. Look, don't worry about offending me, or horrifying me, or whatever. That's the way you think. I can understand, or I can try to at least. Just explain however it makes sense to you."

She took a deep breath and stared past me.

"So Jasper wasn't sure if he'd ever come across someone who was as"—she hesitated, looking for the right word—"appealing as you are to me. Which makes me think not." Her eyes flickered to me. "He would remember this."

She looked away again. "Emmett has been on the wagon longer, so to speak, and he understood what I meant. He says twice, for him, once stronger than the other."

"And for you?"

"Never before this."

We stared at each other again. This time I broke the silence.

"What did Emmett do?"

It was the wrong question to ask. She cringed, and her face was suddenly tortured.

"Okay, so I guess that was a dumb question." I realized. 

She stared at me with eyes that pleaded for understanding. "Even the strongest of us fall off the wagon, don't we?"

"Are you... asking for my permission?" I whispered. A shiver rolled down my spine that had nothing to do with my freezing hands.

Her eyes flew wide in shock. "No!"

"But you're saying there's no hope, right?"

I knew it wasn't normal, facing death like this without any real sense of fear. It wasn't that I was super brave, I knew that. It was just that I wouldn't have chosen differently, even knowing it would end this way.

She looked angry, but I didn't think she was angry with me. "Of course there's hope. Of course I won't..." She left the sentence hanging. Her eyes felt like they were physically burning mine. "It's different for us. Emmett... these were strangers he happened across. It was a long time ago. He wasn't as practiced, as careful as he is now. And he's never been as good at this as I am."

She fell silent, watching me intently as I thought it through.

"So if we'd met... oh, in a dark alley or something..."

"It took everything I had—every single year of practice and sacrifice and effort—not to jump up in the middle of that class full of children and—" She broke off, her eyes darting away from me. "When you walked past me, I could have ruined everything Carine has built for us, right then and there. If I hadn't been denying my thirst for the last... too many years, I wouldn't have been able to stop myself."

She stared at me grimly, both of us remembering.

"You must have thought I was possessed."

"I couldn't understand why. How you could hate me, just like that... it was bizarre."

"To me, it was like you were some kind of demon, summoned straight from my own personal hell to ruin me. The fragrance coming off your skin... I thought it would make me deranged that first day. In that one hour, I thought of a hundred different ways to lure you from the room with me, to get you alone. And I fought them each back, thinking of my family, what I could do to them. I had to run out, to get away before I could speak the words that would make you follow...."

She looked up then, her golden eyes scorching from under her lashes, hypnotic and deadly.

"You would have come," she promised.

I tried to speak calmly, "Probably. I wanted to give you a piece of my mind," 

She frowned at our hands. "And then, as I tried to rearrange my schedule in a pointless attempt to avoid you, there you were—in that close, warm little room, the scent was maddening. I so very nearly took you then. There was only one other frail human there—so easily dealt with."

It was so strange seeing my memories from her point of view. Understanding for the first time what it had all meant, understanding the danger. 

“But I resisted. I don’t know how. I forced myself not to wait for you, not to follow you from the school. It was easier outside, when I couldn’t smell you anymore, to think clearly, to make the right decision. I left the others near home—I was too ashamed to tell them how weak I was, they only knew something was very wrong—and then I went straight to Carine, at the hospital, to tell her I was leaving.”

I stared in surprise.

“I traded cars with her—she had a full tank of gas and I was afraid to stop. I didn’t dare to go home, to face Esme. She wouldn’t have let me go without a fight. She would have tried to convince me that it wasn’t necessary....

“By the next morning I was in Alaska.” She sounded ashamed, as if she was admitting some huge display of cowardice. “I spent two days there, with some old acquaintances… but I was homesick. I hated knowing I’d upset Esme, and the rest of them, my adopted family. In the pure air of the mountains it was hard to believe you were so irresistible. I convinced myself it was weak to run away. I’d dealt with temptation before, not of this magnitude, not even close, but I was strong. Who were you, an insignificant human girl”—she grinned suddenly—“to chase me from the place I wanted to be? Ah, the deadly sin of pride.” She shook her head. “So I came back.…”

I patiently listened to her side of the story, completely enthralled. 

“I took precautions, hunting, feeding more than usual before seeing you again. I was sure that I was strong enough to treat you like any other human. I was arrogant about it.

“It was unquestionably a complication that I couldn’t simply read your thoughts to know what your reaction was to me. I wasn’t used to having to go to such circuitous measures, listening to your words in Jessica’s mind.… Her mind isn’t very original, and it was annoying to have to stoop to that. And then I couldn’t know if you really meant what you were saying, or just saying what you thought your audience wanted to hear. It was all extremely irritating.” She frowned at the memory.

“I wanted you to forget my behavior that first day, if possible, so I tried to talk with you like I would with any person. I was eager, actually, hoping to decipher some of your thoughts. But you were too interesting, I found myself caught up in your expressions… and every now and then you would move and the air would stir around you.… The scent would stun me again.…

“Of course, then you were nearly crushed to death in front of my eyes. Later I thought of a perfectly good excuse for why I acted at that moment—because if I hadn’t saved you, if your blood had been spilled there in front of me, I don’t think I could have stopped myself from exposing us for what we are. But I only thought of that excuse later. At the time, all I could think was, not her.”

She shut her eyes, her expression agonized. For a long moment she was silent. I waited eagerly, which probably wasn’t the brightest reaction. But it was such a relief to finally understand the other half of the story.

“In the hospital?” I asked.

Her eyes flashed up to mine. “I was appalled. I couldn’t believe I had put us in danger after all, put myself in your power—you of all people. As if I needed another motive to kill you.” We both flinched as that word slipped out, and she continued quickly. “But the disaster had the opposite effect. I fought with Rosalie, Emmett, and Jasper when they suggested that now was the time… the worst fight we’ve ever had. Carine sided with me, and Archie.” She frowned sourly when she said his name. I couldn’t imagine why. “Esme told me to do whatever I had to in order to stay.” She shook her head, a little indulgent smile on her lips.

“All that next day I eavesdropped on the minds of everyone you spoke to, shocked that you kept your word. I didn’t understand you at all. But I knew that I couldn’t become more involved with you. I did my very best to stay as far from you as possible. And every day the perfume of your skin, your breath… it hit me as hard as the very first day.”

She met my eyes again, and hers were oddly tender.

“And for all that,” she continued, “I’d have fared better if I had exposed us all at that first moment, than if now, here—with no witnesses and nothing to stop me—I were to hurt you.”

“Why?”

“Oh, Bella.” She touched my cheekbone lightly with her fingertips. A shock ran through me at this casual contact. “Bella, I couldn’t survive hurting you. You don’t know how it’s tortured me”—she looked down, ashamed again—“the thought of you, still, white, cold… to never see your face turn red again, to never see that flash of intuition in your eyes when you see through my pretenses… I couldn’t bear it.” She lifted her glorious, agonized eyes to mine. “You are the most important thing to me now. The most important thing to me ever.”

My head was spinning at this rapid change in direction. Just minutes ago I’d thought we were talking about my imminent death. Now, suddenly, we were making declarations.

I gripped her hand tighter, staring into her golden eyes.

“You already know how I feel, Edythe. There’s nothing in this world that could keep me from you. And at the risk of sounding like a telenovela; I’d rather die than live without you at this point.” I cringed at the melodrama behind my words. “Sorry, I’m a little bit of an idiot sometimes.” 

“You are an idiot,” she agreed with a laugh, and I laughed with her. This whole situation was idiocy—and impossibility and magic.

“And so the lion fell in love with the lamb,” she murmured. The word was like another electric jolt to my system.

I tried to cover my reaction. “What a stupid lamb.”

She sighed. “What a sick, masochistic lion.”

She stared into the forest for a long time, and I wondered what she was thinking.

“Why…?” I began, but then paused, not sure how to continue.

She looked at me and smiled; sunlight shimmered off her face. “Yes?”

“Tell me why you ran away from me before.”

Her smile faded. “You know why.”

“No, I mean, exactly what did I do wrong? I need to learn how to make this easier for you, what I should and shouldn’t do. This, for example”—I stroked my thumb across her wrist—“seems to be all right.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Bella. It was my fault.”

“But I want to help make you more comfortable around me.”

“Well…” She thought for a moment. “It was just how close you were. Most humans instinctively shy away from us, are repelled by our alienness.… I wasn’t expecting you to come so close. And the smell of your throat—” She broke off, looking to see if she’d upset me.

“Okay.” I tucked my chin chuckling. “No throat exposure, I’ll invest in some more scarves.”

She grinned. “No, really, it was more the surprise than anything else.”

She raised her free hand and moved my hair way from my face before placing her hand gently on the side of my neck. I held very still, recognizing that the chill of her touch was supposed to be a natural warning, and wondering why I couldn’t feel that. I felt something else entirely. Love. 

“You see?” she said. “Perfectly fine.”

My blood was racing, and I wished I could slow it down. It must make everything so much more difficult for her—the thudding pulse in my veins.

“I love that,” she murmured. She carefully freed her other hand. My hands fell limp into my lap. Softly she brushed her hand across the warm patch in my cheek, then held my face between her small, cold hands.

“Be very still,” she whispered.

I was paralyzed as she suddenly leaned into me, resting her cheek against the valley of my breasts—listening to my heart. I blushed at her closeness. I could feel the ice of her skin through my thin shirt. With deliberate slowness her hands moved to my shoulders and her arms wrapped around my neck, holding me tight against her. I listened to the sound of her careful, even breathing, which seemed to be keeping time with my heartbeats. One breath in for every three beats, one breath out for another three.

“Hmm.” She hummed. 

I don’t know how long we sat without moving. It could have been hours. Eventually, the throb of my pulse quieted. I knew at any moment it could be too much, and my life could end—so quickly that I might not even notice. And I still wasn’t afraid. I couldn’t think of anything, except that she was touching me. 

And then, too soon, she unwrapped her arms from around my neck and leaned away. Her eyes were peaceful again.

“It won’t be so hard again,” she said with satisfaction.

“Was that very hard for you?”

“Not nearly as bad as I imagined it would be. And you?”

“No, that wasn’t… bad for me.”

We smiled at each other.

“Here.” She picked up my hand—easily, like she didn’t even have to think about it—and placed it against her cheek. “Do you feel how warm you’ve made me?”

And it was almost warm, her usually icy skin. But I barely noticed, because I was touching her face, something I’d been dreaming and fantasizing about since the first day I’d seen her.

“Don’t move,” I whispered.

No one could be still like a vampire. She closed her eyes and turned into a statue.

I moved even more slowly than she had, careful not to make one unexpected move. I stroked her cheek, let my fingertips graze across her lavender eyelids, the light shadows under her eyes. I traced the shape of her straight nose, and then, so carefully, her perfect lips. Her lips parted and I could feel her cool breath on my fingertips. I wanted to lean in and kiss her, but I knew that might be too much. If she could control herself, so could I—if only on a much smaller scale.

I tried to move in slow motion so that she could guess everything I would do before I did it. I let my palms slide down the sides of her slender neck, let them rest on her shoulders while my thumbs followed the impossibly fragile curve of her collarbones.

She was much stronger than I was, in so many ways. I seemed to lose control of my hands as they skimmed over the points of her shoulders and down across her sharp shoulder blades. I couldn’t stop myself as my arms wrapped around her, pulling her against my chest again. My hands crossed behind her and wrapped around either side of her waist.

She leaned into me, bending in order to fit, but that was the only movement. She wasn’t breathing.

So that gave me a time limit.

I pressed my face into her hair for one long second, inhaling a deep lungful of her scent. Then I forced myself to peel my hands off her and move away. One of my hands wouldn’t obey completely; it trailed down her arm and settled on her wrist.

“Sorry,” I muttered.

She opened her eyes, and they were hungry. Not in a way to make me afraid, but in a way that made the muscles in the pit of my stomach tighten into knots and sent my pulse hammering through my veins again.

“I wish…,” she whispered, “I wish that you could feel the… complexity… the confusion… I feel. That you could understand.”

She raised her hand to my face, then she grabbed a single curl from my hair and began playing with it. 

“Tell me,” I breathed.

“I don’t know if I can. You know, on the one hand, the hunger—the thirst—that, being what I am, I feel for you. And I think you can understand that, to an extent. Though”—and she half-smiled—“as you are not addicted to any illegal substances, you probably can’t empathize completely.

“But…” Her fingers moved away from my curl and touched my lips lightly, and my heart raced. “There are other things I want, other hungers. Hungers I don’t even understand myself.”

“I might understand that better than you think.”

“I’m not used to feeling so human. Is it always like this?”

“For me?” I paused. “No, never. Never before this.”

She put her hands on both sides of my face. “I don’t know how to be close to you. I don’t know if I can.”

I put my hand over hers, then leaned forward slowly till my forehead was touching hers.

“This is enough,” I sighed, closing my eyes, meaning it. 

We sat like that for a moment, and then her hands moved to the back of my head. She angled her face up and pressed her lips to my forehead. The rhythm of my pulse exploded into a jagged sprint.

“You’re a lot better at this than you give yourself credit for,” I said when I could speak again.

She leaned away, taking my hands again. “I was born with human instincts—they may be buried deep, but they exist.”

We stared at each other for another immeasurable moment; I wondered if she was as unwilling to move as I was. But the light was fading, the shadows of the trees almost touching us.

“You have to go.”

“I thought you couldn’t read my mind.” I frowned. 

She smiled. “It’s getting clearer.”

A sudden excitement flared in her eyes. “Can I show you something?”

“Anything.”

She grinned. “How about a faster way back to the truck?”

I looked at her warily.

“Don’t you want to see how I travel in the forest?” she pressed. “I promise it’s safe.”

“Will you… turn into a bat?”

She burst into laughter. “Like I haven’t heard that one before!”

“Right, I’m sure you get that all the time.”

She was on her feet in another invisibly fast motion. She offered me her hand, and I jumped up next to her. She whirled around and looked back at me over her shoulder.

“Climb on my back.”

I blinked. “Huh?”

“Don’t be a coward, Bella, I promise this won’t hurt.”

She stood there waiting with her back toward me, totally serious.

“I don’t know if I want a piggyback ride right now...

She turned her back to me again. “Trust me.” 

I hesitantly put my arms around her neck.

“Come on,” she said impatiently. She reached back with one hand and grabbed my leg, yanking my knee up past her hip.

“Whoa!”

But she already had my other leg, and instead of toppling backward, she easily supported my weight. She moved my legs into position around her waist. 

“This is cute.” I laughed. “Wait!”

“For what, Bella?”

I leaned my face down and dropped a gentle kiss on her neck. 

Suddenly she grabbed my hand and pressed my palm to her face. She inhaled deeply.

“Easier all the time,” she said.

And then she was running.

For the first time, I felt actual fear for my life. Terror.

She streaked through the forest like a bullet, like a ghost. There was no sound, no evidence that her feet ever touched the ground. Her breathing never changed, never indicated any effort. But the trees flew by at deadly speeds, always missing us by inches.

I was too shocked to close my eyes, though the cool air whipped against my face and burned them. My hair was flying behind me and I was sure it was going to stick like that when she stopped. It felt like I was sticking my head out the window of an airplane in flight.

Then it was over. We’d hiked hours this morning to reach Edythe’s meadow, and now, in a matter of minutes—not even minutes, seconds—we were back to the truck.

“Exhilarating, isn’t it?” Her voice was high, excited.

She stood motionless, waiting for me to unwind my legs and step away from her. I did try, but I couldn’t get my muscles to unfreeze. My arms and legs stayed locked while my head spun uncomfortably.

“Bella?” she asked, anxious now.

“I might need to lie down,” I gasped.

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

It took me a few seconds to remember how to loosen my fingers. Then everything seemed to come undone at the same time, and I half-fell off her, stumbling backward until I lost my footing and finished the other half of the fall.

She held out her hand, trying not to laugh, but I refused her offer. Instead, I stayed down and put my head between my knees. My ears were ringing and my head whirled in queasy circles.

A cold hand grabbed my hair, tying it up before it rested lightly against the back of my neck. It helped.

“I guess that wasn’t the best idea,” she mused.

I tried to be positive, but my voice was hollow. “No, it was very interesting.”

“Hah! You lost all that golden color of yours! I didn’t even know that was possible!”

“I think I should have closed my eyes.”

“Remember that next time.”

I looked up, startled. “Next time?”

She laughed, her mood still flying.

“Show-off,” I muttered, and put my head down again.

After a half-minute, the swirling motion slowed.

“Look at me, Bella.”

I lifted my head, and she was right there, her face just inches from mine. Her beauty was like a sucker punch that left me stunned. I couldn’t get used to it.

“I was thinking, while I was running—”

“About not hitting trees, I hope,” I interrupted breathlessly.

“Silly Bella. Running is second nature to me. It’s not something I have to think about.”

“Show-off,” I muttered again.

She smiled. “No, I was thinking there was something I wanted to try.” She put her hands on my face again.

I couldn’t breathe.

She hesitated. It felt like a test, making sure this was safe, that she was still in control of herself.

And then her cold, perfect lips pressed very softly against mine. And I was seeing stars. Her lips moves softly and carefully against mine and I mirrored their moves. 

But then, I wasn’t thinking. I was just feeling. My hands moved on their and tangled themselves into her hair, pulling her closer. 

Immediately, she turned to unresponsive stone beneath my lips. Her hands gently, but forcibly, pushed my face back. I opened my eyes and saw her expression.

“Whoops,” I said.

“That’s an understatement.”

Her eyes were wild, her jaw clenched in restraint. My face was still just inches from hers, my fingers twisted through her hair.

“Should I…?” I tried to disengage myself, to give her some room.

Her hands didn’t release me.

“No, it’s tolerable. Wait for a moment, please.” Her voice was polite, controlled.

I kept my eyes on hers, watching as the excitement in them faded and gentled.

She grinned, obviously pleased with herself and dropped a sweet kiss on my lips. “There.”

“Tolerable?” I asked, smiling through my burning face. 

She laughed. “I’m stronger than I thought. It’s nice to know.”

“And I’m not. Sorry.”

“You are only human, after all.”

I sighed. “Yeah.”

She freed her hair from my fingers, and then she was on her feet in one of her lithe, nearly invisible movements. She held her hand out again, and this time I took it and pulled myself up. I needed the support; my balance hadn’t returned yet. I wobbled slightly as I took a step away from her.

“Are you still reeling from the run, or was it my kissing expertise?” She seemed very human as she laughed now, careless and lighthearted. She was a new Edythe, different than the one I’d known, and I was even more besotted by her. It would cause me physical pain to be separated from her now.

“Both.”

“Maybe you should let me drive.”

“Uh, I think I’ve had enough of your need for speed for today.…”

“I can drive better than you on your best day,” she said. “You have much slower reflexes.”

“I believe you, but I don’t think my truck could handle your driving.”

“Some trust, please, Bella.”

I removed on strap from my backpack and opened the small pocket on the front, pulling out my keys. I pursed my lips, like I was deliberating, then shook my head with a tight grin.

“Nope. Not a chance.”

She raised her eyebrows, her face playful as she hooked a finger around my jeans belt hoop, and yanked. I nearly stumbled into her, catching myself with one hand against her shoulder.

“Bella, I’ve already expended a great deal of personal effort at this point to keep you alive. I’m not about to let you get behind the wheel of a vehicle when you can’t even walk straight. Friends don’t let friends drive drunk.”

“Drunk?” I objected, then laughed. “This is not how I behave when I’m drunk trust me. That’s not a Bella you want to meet.”

She move her face closer to mine, and ignored my statement. “You’re intoxicated by my very presence.”

“I can’t argue with that.” I sighed. There was no way around it—I couldn’t resist her in anything. I held the key high and dropped it, watching her hand flash like lightning to catch it without a sound. “Take it easy. My truck is a senior citizen.”

“Very sensible.”

She dropped my belt hoop. 

“So you’re not affected at all? By my presence?”

She turned back and reached for my hand, holding it to her face again. She leaned into my palm, her eyes sliding closed. She took a slow, deep breath.

“Regardless…,” she murmured. Her eyes flashed open and she grinned. “I have better reflexes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was thinking. Which ending would you guys want? The original Twilight ending that gives me an opportunity to fix New Moon, or the Life and Death ending?


	14. Mind Over Matter

I had to admit; Edythe's driving was just fine. She kept the speed reasonable and didn't push my trucks boundaries. Like so many things, driving seemed to be effortless for her. She barely looked at the road, yet the truck was always perfectly centered in her lane. She drove one-handed, her other hand was linked with mine in the middle. Sometimes she gazed into the setting sun, which glittered off her skin in rainbow shimmers. Sometimes she glanced at me—stared into my eyes or looked down at our hands twined together smiling.

She had tuned the radio to an oldies station, and she sang along with a song I'd never heard. Her voice was as perfect as everything else about her, soaring an octave above the melody. She knew every line.

"You like fifties music?" I asked.

"Music in the fifties was good. Much better than the sixties, the seventies were great too." She smiled delicately. "The eighties were bearable."

"Are you ever going to tell me how old you are?"

I wondered if my question would upset her cheerful mood, but she just smiled.

"Does it matter very much?"

"No, but I'm curious, and at the very least I should know everything about the person I'm with."

"I wonder if it will upset you," she said to herself. She stared straight into the sun; a minute passed.

"Try me," I finally said.

She looked into my eyes, seeming to forget the road completely for a while. Whatever she saw must have encouraged her. She turned to face the last few orange rays of the setting sun and sighed.

"I was born in Chicago in 1901." She paused and glanced at me from the corner of her eye. My face was carefully arranged, unsurprised, patient for her to continue. She smiled a tiny smile and continued. "Carine found me in a hospital in the summer of 1918. I was seventeen, and I was dying of the Spanish influenza."

She heard my gasp and looked into my eyes again.

"I don't remember it very well. It was a long time ago, and human memories fade." She seemed lost in thought for a minute, but before I could prompt her, she went on. "I do remember how it felt when Carine saved me. It's not an easy thing, not something you could forget."

"Your parents?"

"They had already died from the disease. I was alone. That's why she chose me. In all the chaos of the epidemic, no one would ever realize I was gone."

"How did she... save you?"

A few seconds passed, and when she spoke again she seemed to be choosing her words very carefully.

"It was difficult. Not many of us have the restraint necessary to accomplish it. But Carine has always been the most humane, the most compassionate of all of us.... I don't think you could find her equal anywhere in history." She paused. "For me, it was merely very, very painful."

She set her jaw, and I could tell she wasn't going to say anything more about it. I filed it away for later. My curiosity on the subject was hardly idle. There were lots of angles I needed to think through on this particular issue, angles that were only beginning to occur to me.

Her soft voice interrupted my thoughts. "She acted from loneliness. That's usually the reason behind the choice. I was the first in Carine's family, though she found Esme soon after. She fell from a cliff. They took her straight to the hospital morgue, though, somehow, her heart was still beating."

"So you have to be dying, then...."

"No, that's just Carine. She would never do that to someone who had another choice, any other choice." The respect in her voice was profound whenever she spoke of her adoptive mother. "It is easier, she says, though, if the heart is weak." She stared at the now-dark road, and I could feel the subject closing again.

"And what about Emmett and Rosalie?"

"Carine brought Rosalie into our family next. I didn't realize till much later that she was hoping she would be to me what Esme was to her—she was careful with her thoughts around me." She rolled her eyes. "But she was never more than a sister, and I was still struggling to accept my sexuality at that time. It was only two years later that she found Emmett. She was hunting—we were in Appalachia at the time—and found a bear about to finish him off. She carried him back to Carine, more than a hundred miles, afraid she wouldn't be able to do it herself. I'm only beginning to guess how difficult that journey was for her." She threw a pointed glance in my direction and raised our hands, still folded together, to brush her cheek against my hand.

"But she made it."

"Yes. She saw something in his face that made her strong enough. And they've been together ever since. Sometimes they live separately from us, as a married couple. But the younger we pretend to be, the longer we can stay in any given place. Forks is perfect in many ways, so we all enrolled in high school." She laughed. "I suppose we'll have to go to the wedding in a few years. Again."

"Archie and Jasper?"

"Archie and Jasper are two very rare creatures. They both developed a conscience, as we refer to it, with no outside guidance. Jasper belonged to another... family, a very different kind of family. He became depressed, and left to wandered on his own. Archie found him. Like me, he has certain gifts."

"Really?" I interrupted, fascinated. "But you said you were the only one who could hear people's thoughts."

"That's true. He knows other things. He sees things—things that might happen, things that are coming. But it's very subjective. The future isn't set in stone. Things change."

Her jaw set when she said that, and her eyes darted to my face and away so quickly that I wasn't sure if I'd only imagined it. I was sure she was hiding something about my future, something Archie had seen. But that wasn't something I was curious about at the moment. The less you know about where you're heading, the better.

"What kinds of things does he see?"

"Archie saw Jasper and knew that he was looking for him before he knew it himself. He saw Carine, and our family, and they came together to find us. He's most sensitive to non-humans. He always knows, for example, when another group of our kind is coming near. And any threat they may pose."

"Are there a lot of... your kind?" That wasn't something I'd considered, it was surprising to me.

My mind got caught on one word she'd said. Threat. It was the first time she'd ever said anything to hint that her world wasn't just dangerous for humans. It made me anxious, and I was about to ask a new question, but she was already answering my first.

"No, not many. But most won't settle in any one place. Only those like us, who've given up hunting on people"—a sly glance in my direction—"can live together with humans for any length of time. We've only found one other family like ours, in a small village in Alaska. We lived together for a time, but there were so many of us that we became too noticeable. Those of us who live... differently, tend to band together."

"And the others?"

"Nomads, for the most part. We've all lived that way at times. It gets tedious, like anything else. But we run across the others now and then, because most of us prefer the North."

"Why is that?"

We were parked in front of my house now, and she turned off the truck. The silence that followed its roar felt intense. It was very dark; there was no moon. The porch light was off, so I knew my dad wasn't home yet.

"Did you have your eyes open this afternoon?" she teased. "Do you think I could walk down the street in the sunlight without causing traffic accidents?"

I thought to myself that she could stop traffic even without the light show.

"There's a reason why we chose the Olympic Peninsula, one of the most sunless places in the world. It's nice to be able to go outside in the day. You wouldn't believe how tired you can get of nighttime in eighty-odd years."

"So that's where the legends came from?"

"Probably."

"And Archie came from another family, like Jasper?"

"No, and that is a mystery. Archie doesn't remember his human life at all. And he doesn't know who created him. He awoke alone. Whoever made him walked away, and none of us understand why, or how, he could. If Archie hadn't had that other sense, if he hadn't seen Jasper and Carine and known that he would someday become one of us, he probably would have turned into a total savage."

There was so much to think through, so much I still wanted to ask. But just then my stomach growled. I'd been so interested, I hadn't even noticed I was hungry. I realized now that I was starving.

"I'm sorry, I'm keeping you from dinner."

"I'm fine, really."

"I don't spend a lot of time around people who eat food. I forget."

"I want to stay with you." It was easier to say in the darkness, knowing how my voice would betray me, my hopeless addiction to her.

"Can't I come in?" she asked.

"Would you like to?" My eyes lit up.

"Yes, if you don't mind."

I smiled. "I do not."

I climbed out of the truck and she was already there; then she flitted ahead and disappeared. The lights turned on inside.

She met me at the door. It was so surreal to see her inside my house, yet she somehow seemed to fit in to the frames of my life.

"Did I leave that unlocked?" I wondered.

"No, I used the key from under the eave."

I hadn't thought I'd used that key in front of her. I remembered how she'd found my truck key, and shrugged.

"You're hungry, right?" And she led the way to the kitchen, as if she'd been here a million times before. She turned on the kitchen light and then sat at the kitchen table. The kitchen didn't look so dingy anymore. But maybe that was because I couldn't really look at anything but her. I stood there smiling at her presence in the little part of my world.

"Eat something, Bella."

I nodded and turned to find food. There was lasagna left over from last night. I put the last square on a plate, then set the plate in the microwave. I washed the pan while the microwave revolved, filling the kitchen with the smell of tomatoes and oregano. My stomach growled again.

"Hmm," she said.

"What?"

"I'm going to have to do a better job in the future."

I laughed. "A better job at what?"

"Remember that you're human. I should have, I don't know, packed a picnic or something today."

The microwave dinged and I pulled the plate out, then set it down quickly when it burned my hand.

"Don't worry about it, I can take care of myself" I winked.

I found a fork and started eating. I was really hungry. The first bite scalded my mouth, but I kept chewing.

"Does that taste good?" she asked.

I swallowed. "I'm not sure. I think I just burned my taste buds off. It tasted good yesterday."

She raised an eyebrow, unconvinced.

"Do you ever miss food? Burgers? Chocolate? Oh my god, coffee?"

She shook her head. "I hardly remember food. I couldn't even tell you what my favorites were. It doesn't smell... edible now."

"That's so fucking sad to me, I love food."

"It's not such a huge sacrifice." She said it sadly, like there were other things on her mind, sacrifices that were considered huge by her.

I used the dish towel as a hot pad and carried the plate to the table so I could sit by her.

"Do you miss other parts about being human?"

She thought about that for a second. "I don't actually miss anything, because I'd have to remember it to be able to miss it, and like I said, my human life is hard to remember. But there are things I think I'd like. I suppose you could say things I was jealous of."

"Like what?"

"Sleep is one. Never-ending consciousness gets tedious. I think I'd enjoy temporary oblivion. It looks interesting."

I ate a few bites, thinking about that. "It's second best next to food, to be honest. What do you do all night?"

She hesitated, then pursed her lips. "Do you mean in general?"

I wondered why she sounded like she didn't want to answer. Was it too broad a question?

"No, you don't have to be general. Like, what are you going to do tonight after you leave?"

"Don't do much. I read, listen to music, spend time with my family.... think about you... though I feel like I must confess...." she trailed off looking guilty.

"What?"

She looked uncomfortable, worried. "I have spent a few nights here...."

I blinked, my mouth hanging.

"You come here?"

"I haven't for a while; I know it's a wired, stalker-like thing to do."

"Why?"

"I have a hard time being away from you. Also, you're interesting when you sleep," she said casually. "You talk."

My mouth popped open. Heat flashed up my neck and into my face. I knew I talked in my sleep, of course; my mother teased me about it. I hadn't thought it was something I needed to worry about here.

She watched my reaction, staring up at me apprehensively from under her lashes.

"Are you very angry with me?"

Was I? I didn't think so. I actually wish I'd been awake when she was here. I have trouble being away from her too. But was this the kind of behavior I wanted to encourage? Having a vampire stalker. No matter how head over heels I am for her? 

"How do you... Where do you... What did I...?" I couldn't finish any of my thoughts.

She put her hand on my cheek. The blood under her fingers felt burning hot next to her cold hand. "Don't be upset. I didn't mean any harm. I promise, I was very much in control of myself. If I'd thought there was any danger, I would have left immediately. I just... wanted to be where you were."

"I... I'm going to give you permission to be in my room whenever you'd like. As long as I know you're there. But, that's not what I'm worried about."

"What are you worried about?"

"What did I say?"

She smiled. "You miss your mother. When it rains, the sound makes you restless. You used to talk about home a lot, but it's less often now. Once you said, 'It's too green.'" She laughed softly, hoping not to offend me again.

"Anything else?" I demanded.

She knew what I was getting at. "You did say my name," she admitted.

I sighed in defeat. "A lot?"

"Define 'a lot.'"

"Oh god," I groaned.

Like it was easy, natural, she pulled her chair closer and put her arms around my shoulders and leaned down to put her head against my chest. Automatically, my arms came up to wrap around her. To hold her there.

"Don't be self-conscious," she whispered. "You already told me that you dream about me, remember?"

"That's different. I knew what I was saying."

"If I could dream at all, it would be about you. And I'm not ashamed of it."

I stroked her hair. I guessed I really didn't mind, when it came down to it. It wasn't like I expected her to follow normal human rules anyway. That human instinct of right and wrong was gone from her. She wasn't human and the rules she'd made for herself seemed like enough.

"I'm not ashamed," I whispered.

She hummed, almost like a purr, her cheek pressed over my heart.

Then we both heard the sound of tires on the brick driveway, saw the headlights flash through the front windows, down the hall to us. I jumped, and dropped my arms as she pulled away.

"Do you want your father to know that I'm here?" she asked.

I tried to think it through quickly. "Um..."

"Another time, then..."

And I was alone.

"Edythe?" I whispered.

I heard a quiet laugh, and then nothing else.

My dads key turned in the door.

"Bella?" he called. I remembered finding that funny before; who else would it be? Suddenly he didn't seem so far off base.

"In here."

Was my voice okay? I took another bite of my lasagna so I could be chewing when he came in. His footsteps sounded extra noisy after I'd spent the day with Edythe.

"Did you take all the lasagna?" he asked looking at my plate.

"Oh, sorry. Here, have some."

"No worries, kid. I'll make myself a sandwich."

"Sorry," I mumbled again.

Dad banged around the kitchen getting what he needed. I worked on eating my plate of food as fast as I could while not choking to death. I was thinking about what Edythe had just said—Do you want your father to know that I'm here? Which was not the same as Do you want your father to know that I was here? in the past tense. So did that mean she hadn't actually left? I hoped so.

Sandwich in hand, dad sat in the chair across from me.

"How was Seattle? Did you have fun?"

"Yeah, it's such a beautiful city, I'm glad I got out of the house. Were the fish biting?"

"Yep. They like the good weather, it seems."

I scraped the last of the lasagna into one huge mouthful and started chewing.

"Got plans for tonight?" he asked suddenly.

I shook my head, maybe a little too emphatically.

"You look kinda keyed up, Bells," he noted.

Of course he would have to pay attention tonight.

I swallowed. "Really?"

"It's Saturday," he mused.

I didn't respond.

"I guess you're missing that dance tonight...."

"As intended," I said.

He nodded. "Sure, dancing, I get it. But maybe next week—you could take a girl out for dinner or something. Get out of the house. Socialize."

"I'm okay, dad."

He frowned. "Well, there're lots fish in the sea, go find one, Bella. Be young, have some fun."

"Not at the rate you're going."

He laughed. "I do my best.... So you're not going out tonight?" he asked again.

"Nowhere to go," I told him. "Besides, I'm tired. I'm just going to go to bed early again."

I got up and took my plate to the sink.

"Uh-huh," he said, chewing thoughtfully. "None of the girls in town are your type, eh?"

I shrugged as I scrubbed the plate.

I could feel him staring at me, and I tried really hard to keep the blood out of my face. I wasn't sure I was succeeding. The only girl I was interested was probably still in this house.

"Don't be too hard on a small town," he said. "I know we don't have the variety of a big city—"

"There's plenty of variety, Dad. Don't worry about me." I rolled my eyes.

"Okay, okay. None of my business anyway." He sounded kind of dejected.

I sighed. "Well, I'm done. I'll see you in the morning."

"'Night, Bella."

I hoped he would take the hint that I was really just going to bed. I was sure he was under the impression that I was going to sneak out. But really, the only place I wanted to be was with Edythe.

I shut my bedroom door loud enough for him to hear downstairs, then sprinted as quietly as I could to the window. I shoved it open and leaned out into the dark. I couldn't see anything, just the shadow of the treetops.

"Edythe?" I whispered out into the night.

The quiet, laughing response came from behind me. "Yes?"

I spun around so fast I knocked a book off my desk. It fell with a thud to the floor.

She was lying across my bed, hands behind her head, ankles crossed, a huge dimpled smile on her face. She looked the color of frost in the darkness.

"Oh shit!" I gasped, grabbing the window for support.

"I'm sorry," she said, giggling.

"No worries, my heart hurts but it's okay,"

She sat up—moving slowly like she did when she was either trying to act human or trying not to startle me—and dangled her legs over the edge of the bed. She patted the space next to her.

I walked unsteadily to the bed and sat down beside her. She put her hand on mine.

"How's your heart?"

"You tell me—I'm sure you hear it better than I do."

She laughed quietly.

We sat there for a moment in silence, both listening to my heartbeat slow. I thought about Edythe in my room... and my father's suspicious questions... and my lasagna breath.

"Can I have a minute?"

"Certainly."

I stood, and then looked at her, sitting there all perfect on the edge of my bed, and I thought that maybe I was just hallucinating everything.

"Don't think about leaving," I pointed a finger at her.

"I won't move a muscle," she promised.

And then she became totally motionless, a statue again, perched on the edge of my bed.

I grabbed my pajamas out of my drawer and hurried to the bathroom, banging the door so dad would know it was occupied.

I brushed my teeth twice. Then I stripped and jumped in the shower, scrubbing and washing my body in a hurry before I got out and dried myself with my towel and redressing. I always just wore a pair of sweatpants and an oversized T-shirt to be. It made me look and feel smaller than I already.

When I opened the door, I had another heart attack. Dad was at the top of the stairs; I almost walked into him.

I screamed before covering up my mouth with my hand.

Dad laughed, "Sorry, kid. Didn't mean to scare you."

I took a deep breath, placing my hand over my fast beating heart, "I'm okay."

He looked at my pajamas, then narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "Hm,"

"You heading to bed, too?" I asked.

"Yeah, I guess. I've got an early one again tomorrow."

"Okay. Goodnight, dad,"

His suspicious look grew, "Yeah."

I walked into my room, glad that the bed wasn't visible from where Charlie was standing, then shut the door firmly behind me.

Edythe hadn't moved at all, she was in the exact same spot as I left her. I smiled and her lips twitched; she relaxed, and she was suddenly human again. Or, we'll, almost human. I took my place next to her and she twisted to face me, pulling her legs up and crossing them.

"You look so cute in your nightwear," she smiled, a soft look crossing her face. "So little,"

"Hey, you're little too, actually you're smaller than me,"

She rolled her eyes. "By two inches. That's nothing."

I grinned, "Still taller, little one,"

The soft look on her face grew, she looked almost sleepy as she reached out to hold my hand, bringing it to her lips for a kiss. I looked at her as she did. This felt right. It felt really natural, but at the same time, I couldn't believe I was so lucky. What had I ever done to deserve this? To deserve her.

"You're dad thinks your up to something. Or at least that you're sneaking out," she told me.

"I know, apparently I look keyed up."

"Are you?"

"A little more than that, I think. Thank you. For staying."

"It's what I wanted, too."

My heart started beating... not faster exactly, but stronger somehow. For the same reason as mine, she wanted to be with me.

Moving at human speed, she unfolded her legs and draped them across mine. Then she curled up against my chest again the way she seemed to prefer, with her ear over my heart. I was suddenly aware that I wasn't wearing a bra and it made me think. I wanted to ask her about sex, not because I was desperate to have her in every way possible know to human and vampire kind. Though that was a reason. But because I was genuinely curious. My mom always told me that before I got intimate with someone, a conversation needed to be had in order to understand your partner and yourself.

How could I bring that up, though? It's much too soon.

I folded my arms around her and pressed my lips to her hair.

"Mmm," she hummed.

"This...," I murmured into her hair, "... is much easier than I thought it would be."

"Does it seem easy to you?" It sounded like she was smiling. She straightened up before ducking her head, and I felt her nose trace a cold line up the side of my neck.

"Well," I said breathlessly as her lips were brushing the edge of my jaw. "It seems to be easier than it was this morning, at least."

"Hmm," she said. Her arms slid over my shoulders and then wrapped around my neck and then her lips were brushing my ear.

"Why "—my voice shook—"do you think that is?"

"Mind over matter," she breathed right into my ear.

A tremor ran down my body. She froze, then leaned carefully back. One hand brushed across the skin just under the sleeve of my t-shirt.

"You're cold," she said. I could feel the goose bumps rise under her fingertips.

"I'm fine."

She frowned and climbed back to her original position. My arms weren't willing to let her go. As she slid out of them, my hands stayed on her hips.

"Your whole body is shivering."

"I don't think that's from being cold," I told her, honestly.

We looked at each other for a second in the dark.

"I'm not sure what I'm allowed to do," I admitted. "How careful do I need to be?"

She hesitated. "It's not easier," she said finally, answering my earlier question. Her hand brushed across my forearm, and I felt goose bumps again. "But this afternoon... I was still undecided. I'm sorry, it was unforgivable for me to behave as I did."

"I forgive you," I murmured.

"Thank you." She smiled and then was serious as she looked down at the bumps on my arm. "You see... I wasn't sure if I was strong enough...." She lifted my hand and pressed it to her cheek, still looking down. "And while there was still that possibility that I might be... overcome"—she breathed in the scent at my wrist—"I was... susceptible. Until I made up my mind that I was strong enough, that there was no possibility at all that I would... that I ever could..."

I'd never seen her struggle so hard for words. It was so human.

"So there's no possibility now?"

She looked up at me finally and smiled. "Mind over matter."

"Sounds easy," I said, grinning so that she knew I was teasing.

"Rather than easy I would say... herculean, but possible. And so... in answer to your other question...It is not easy, and so, if it is acceptable to you, I would prefer if you would... follow my lead?" She let her finger drop. "Is that fair?"

"Of course," I said quickly.

"If it gets to be... too much, I'm sure I will be able to make myself leave."

I frowned. "I will make sure it's not too much."

"It will be harder tomorrow," she said. "I've had the scent of you in my head all day, and I've grown amazingly desensitized. If I'm away from you for any length of time, I'll have to start over again. Not quite from scratch, though, I think."

"Never go away, then," I suggested, shrugging.

Her face relaxed into a smile. "That suits me. Bring on the shackles—I am your prisoner." While she spoke, she laced her cold fingers around my wrist like a manacle. "And now, if you don't mind, may I borrow a blanket?"

It took me a second, "Oh, sure. Here."

I reached behind her with my free hand and snagged the old quilt that was folded over the foot of my bed, then offered it to her. She dropped my wrist, took the blanket and shook it out, then handed it back to me.

"I'd be happier if I knew you were comfortable."

"I'm very comfortable."

"Please?"

Quickly, I threw the quilt messily over me.

She chuckled quietly. "Not exactly what I was thinking." She was already on her feet, rearranging the blanket over my legs and pulling it all the way up to my shoulders. Before I could understand what she was doing, she had climbed onto my lap again and nestled against my chest. The quilt made a barrier between any place that our skin might touch.

"Better?" she asked.

"I'm not sure about that." I laughed.

"Good enough?"

"Better than that."

She laughed. I stroked her hair. That seemed okay.

"It's so strange," she said. "You read about something... you hear about it in other people's minds, you watch it happen to them... and it doesn't prepare you even in the slightest for experiencing it yourself. The glory of first love. It's more than I was expecting."

"Much more," I agreed fervently.

"And other emotions, too—jealousy, for example. I thought I understood that one clearly. I've read about it a hundred thousand times, seen actors portray it in a thousand plays and movies, listened to it in the minds around me daily—even felt it myself in a shallow way, wishing I had what I didn't.... But I was shocked." She scowled. "Do you remember the day that Mike asked you to the dance?"

I nodded, though that day was most memorable to me for a different reason. "The day you started talking to me again."

"I was stunned by the flare of resentment, almost fury, that I felt—I didn't recognize what it was at first. I didn't know jealousy could be so powerful... so painful. And then you refused him, telling him you weren’t straight but women are known to say that when a man doesn’t take no for an answer. So I was confused. It was more aggravating than usual that I couldn't just hear what you were thinking. Was there someone else? Was it simply for Jessica's sake? I knew I had no right to care either way. I tried not to care.

"And then the line started forming."

I groaned, and she laughed.

"I waited," she went on, "more anxious than I should be to hear what you would say to them, to try to decipher your expressions. I couldn't deny the relief I felt, watching the annoyance on your face. But I couldn't be sure. I didn't know what your answer would have been, if I'd asked.... and then Eric asked you and you told him you liked girls, I heard the sincerity in your voice. . That was a big shock for me, it gave me.... hope. Hope that I could actually have a chance with you,"

She looked up at me. "That was the first night I came here. I wrestled all night, watching you sleep, with the chasm between what I knew was right, moral, ethical, honorable, and what I wanted. I knew that if I continued to ignore you as I should, or if I left for a few years, till you were gone, that someday you would find someone you wanted, someone human like Taylor. It made me sad.

"And then"—her voice dropped to an even quieter whisper—"as you were sleeping, you said my name. You spoke so clearly, at first I thought you'd woken. But you rolled over restlessly and mumbled my name once more, and sighed. The emotion that coursed through me then was unnerving... staggering. And I knew I couldn't ignore you any longer."

She was quiet for a moment, probably listening to the uneven pounding of my heart.

"But jealousy... it's so irrational. Just now, when Charlie asked you about girls..."

"That made you jealous. Really?" I laughed, planting a kiss on her head.

"I'm new at this. You're resurrecting the human in me, and everything feels stronger because it's fresh."

"Honestly, though, for that to bother you, after I have to hear that Rosalie—vampire Barbie, Rosalie, Miss Perfect, Rosalie—was meant for you. Emmett or no Emmett, how can I compete with that?"

Her teeth gleamed and her arms wove around my neck again. "There's no competition."

"As you said, jealousy is irrational." Tentatively, I folded my arms around her. "Is this okay?" I checked.

"Very." She sighed happily. "Of course, Rosalie is beautiful in her way, but even if she wasn't like a sister to me, even if she didn't belong with Emmett, she could never have one tenth, no, one hundredth of the attraction you hold for me." She was serious now, thoughtful. "For almost ninety years I've walked among my kind, and yours... all the time thinking I was complete in myself, not realizing what I was seeking. And not finding anything, because you weren't alive yet."

"It doesn't seem fair," I whispered into her hair. "I haven't had to wait at all. Why do I get off so easily?"

"You're right," she agreed. "I should make this harder for you, definitely." Her hand stroked my cheek. "You only have to risk your life every second you spend with me, surely that's not much. You only have to turn your back on nature, on humanity... what is that worth?"

"I'm not feeling deprived."

She turned her face into my chest and whispered, "Not yet."

"What—" I started, but then her body was suddenly motionless. I froze, but she was gone, my arms wrapped around the empty air.

"Lie down," she hissed, but I couldn't tell where she was in the darkness.

I threw myself back on the bed, shaking the quilt out and then rolling on my side, the way I usually slept. I heard the door crack open. Dad was checking up on me. I breathed evenly, like I was asleep.

A long minute passed as I listened for the door to close. Suddenly Edythe was next to me. She lifted my arm and placed it over her shoulders as she burrowed herself closer to me.

"You're a terrible actor—I'd say that career path is out for you."

"There goes my ten-year plan," I muttered. My heart was being obnoxious. She could probably feel it as well as hear it, thudding hard against my rib cage like it might bust threw it like in an old cartoon.

She hummed a melody I didn't recognize. It sounded like a lullaby. Then she paused. "Should I sing you to sleep?"

"Right," I laughed. "Like I could sleep with you so close to me."

"You do it all the time," she reminded me.

"Not with you here," I disagreed, tightening my arms around her.

"You have a point. What shall we do since you don't want to sleep?"

"Honestly? A lot of things that don't qualify as being careful." I admitted.

She didn't say anything; it didn't sound like she was breathing. I went on quickly.

"But since I promised to be careful, what I'd like is to know more about you."

"Ask me anything." I could feel her smile on my chest.

I sifted through my questions for the most important. "Why do you do it?" I asked. "I still don't understand why you work so hard to resist what you... are. Don't misunderstand, of course I'm glad that you do—I've never been happier to be alive. I just don't see why you would bother in the first place."

She answered slowly. "That's a good question, and you are not the first one to ask it. The others—the vast majority of our kind who are quite content with our lot—they, too, wonder at how we live. But you see, just because we've been... dealt a certain hand... it doesn't mean that we can't choose to rise above—to conquer the boundaries of a destiny that none of us wanted. To try to retain whatever essential humanity we can."

I lay still, feeling kind of awed. She was a better person than I would ever be, I suddenly felt the urge to go vegan.

"Did you fall asleep?" she murmured almost silently after I hadn't spoken in a few minutes.

"No."

"Is that all you were curious about?"

"Not quite." I replied softly.

"What else do you want to know?"

"Why can you read minds—why only you? And Archie, seeing the future and everything... why does that happen?"

I felt her shrug under my arm. "We don't really know. Carine theorizes that we all bring something of our strongest human traits with us into the next life, where they are intensified—like our minds, and our senses. She thinks that I must have already been very sensitive to the thoughts of those around me. And that Archie may have had premonitions as a human."

"What did the others bring to their new lives?"

"Carine brought her compassion. Esme brought her ability to love passionately. Emmett brought his strength, Rosalie his... tenacity. Or you could call it pigheadedness," she chuckled. "Jasper is very interesting. He was quite charismatic in his first life, able to influence those around him to see things his way. Now he is able to manipulate the emotions of those near him—calm down a room of angry people, for example, or excite a lethargic crowd, conversely. It's a very subtle gift."

I considered the amazing impossibilities she described, letting it sink in to my brain. This world was far more interesting than I could have ever imagined. She waited patiently while I thought.

"So where did it all start? I mean, Carine changed you, and then someone must have changed her, and so on...."

"Well, where did you come from? Evolution? Creation? Couldn't we have evolved in the same way as other species, predator and prey? Or, if you don't believe that all this world could have just happened on its own, which is hard for me to accept myself, is it so hard to believe that the same force that created the delicate angelfish with the shark, the baby seal and the killer whale, could create both our kinds together?"

"Well, that sure makes me think. Personally, I didn't believe anything like this could be possible. Shit, I didn't even believe in god, just science. Things that could be proven to exist, but you completely shattered that for me. Your existence proves that anything is possible, really."

"It does give you a lot to think about. It's something that ruins any kind of belief when you find out the truth of what really lurks in the night," Her fingers brushed across my lips. "Aren't you tired? It's been a rather long day."

"I just have a few million more questions."

"We have tomorrow, and the next day, and the next...." she kissed my collarbone.

A feeling of euphoria, of pure bliss, filled up my chest, I must be in heaven. I couldn't imagine there was a drug addict in the world who wouldn't trade his favorite fix for this feeling. The feeling of being in love and having that love be returned to you in full.

It was a minute before I could talk again. "Are you sure you won't vanish in the morning? You are a myth, after all."

"I won't leave you," she promised solemnly, and that same feeling, even stronger than before, pumped through my chest, filling my veins.

When I could speak, I said, "One more, then, tonight...." And then the blood rushed up my neck. The darkness that filled my room did nothing to help. I knew she could feel the heat beneath my skin. 

I sighed. "I hope you don't get offended, I'm just simply.... curious."

She waited patiently for me to go on.

I took a deep breath. "Okay, so, obviously, I don't know what is or isn't true about vampires"—the word slipped out accidentally, I froze when my brain reminded me how much she hated the word.

"Yes?"

She sounded normal, like the word didn't mean anything.

I exhaled in relief knowing my choice of word hadn't hurt her.

"Okay, I mean, I just know the things you've told me, and it seems like we're very different. Physically. You look human—only better—but you don't eat or sleep, you know. You don't need the same things that I do."

"Debatable on some levels, but there are definitely truths in what you're saying. What's your question?"

I continued with her permission, "So I'm just a human girl, and you're the most beautiful girl I've ever seen, and I am just overwhelmed by you, and a part of that, naturally, is that I'm insanely attracted to you, which I'm sure you can't have helped but notice, what with your being, extremely aware of my circulatory system, but what I don't know is, if it's like that for you. Or is it like sleeping and eating, which you don't need and I do—though I don't want them nearly as much as I want you?"

She laughed. "Are you asking me about sex, Bella?"

This time my blood didn't react, this was a normal conversation, "Yes,"

She laughed again. "I did climb into your bed, Bella. I believe that makes this line of inquiry quite understandable."

I waited, when she spoke again her voice was calm.

"So, in the general sense—Sex and Vampires One-Oh-One. We all started out human, Bella, and most of those human desires are still there—just obscured behind more powerful desires. But we're not thirsty all the time, and we tend to form very strong bonds. Physical as well as emotional. Rosalie and Emmett, for example, are just like any human couple who are attracted to each other, by which I mean, very, very annoying for those of us who have to live with them, and even more so for the one who can hear their minds."

I laughed quietly, and she joined in.

"Awkward," I murmured.

"You have no idea," she said darkly, then sighed. "And now in the specific sense, Sex and Vampires One-Oh-Two, Bella and Edythe." She sighed again, more slowly this time. "I don't think that would be possible for us."

"Because I would have to get too... close?" I guessed.

"That would be a problem, but that's not the main problem. Bella, you don't know how... well, fragile you are. I don't mean that as an insult, anyone human is fragile to me. I have to mind my actions every moment that we're together so that I don't hurt you. I could kill you quite easily, simply by accident."

I thought about the first few times that she'd touched me, how cautiously she'd moved, how much it had seemed to frighten her. How she would ask me to move my hand, rather than just pulling hers out from under it.

Now she put her palm against my cheek.

"If I were too hasty... if I were at all distracted, I could reach out, meaning to caress your face, and crush your skull by mistake. You don't realize how incredibly breakable you are. I can never, never afford to lose any kind of control when I'm with you."

If her life were in my hands that way, would I have already killed her? I cringed at the thought.

"I think I could be very distracted by you," she murmured.

"I am never not distracted by you."

"Can I ask you something now—you've made me curious...."

"Sure."

"Do you have any experience with sex and humans?"

"Not at all. This is all firsts for me. I told you, I've never felt like this about anyone before, not even close." I spoke honestly. 

"I know. It's just that I hear what other people think. I know that love and lust don't always keep the same company."

"They do for me.... Do you have any experience with sex and humans when you were human? Or vampires?"

"Very little, I was betrothed as a human. I loved him, but it wasn't like this. He doesn't compare to you; how you make me feel. As for sex and vampires, there was a woman, a long time ago..."

"So, you do find me distracting?"

"Indeed." She was smiling again. "Would you like me to tell you the things that distract me?"

"Sure," I grinned.

"It was your eyes first. You have lovely eyes, Bella, blue like the skies. I've spent all my life in rainy climates and so I often miss the sky, but not when I'm with you."

i felt myself blushing, again, before uttering a shy "thank you,"

She giggled. "I'm not alone. Six of your ten admirers started with your eyes, too."

"Ten?"

"They're not all so forward as Taylor and Mike. Do you want a list? You have options."

"Baby, you know there's no other option," I felt my heart sped up as I realized what I called her.

"Next it was your lips—I'm very fond of your beautiful lips, Bella—so pretty " She traced the outline of my lip, ending at my bottom one and separating it from the top. Then moved her hand, brushing agains my collarbone... down my breasts and ended at my hip. "Or maybe it was those hips of yours that was second..." Her fingers lightly gripped at my hip, my breathing sped up. "I'm not entirely sure. It all took me quite by surprise when I realized that not only did I find you mouthwatering, but also beautiful."

My face and neck were burning as she made her list.

"Oh, and I didn't even mention your hair." Her fingers dug themselves into the the tangle of curls on head, gripping slightly in a way that had me holding back a moan.

"Okay, now I know you're making fun." I laughed.

"I'm truly not. Did you know your hair is just precisely the same shade as a teak inlaid ceiling in a monastery I once stayed at in... I think it would be Cambodia now? And those curls, so beautifully wild, nothing like mine."

"Um, no, I did not." I yawned involuntarily.

She laughed. "Did I answer your question to your satisfaction?"

"yes."

"Then you should sleep."

"I'm not sure if I can."

"Do you want me to leave?"

"No!" I said a little too loudly.

She laughed, moving us around so that she was now holding me to her chest, then began to hum that same unfamiliar lullaby—her voice was like an angel's, my own personal angel sent to sing me to sleep.

More tired than I realized, exhausted from a day of mental and emotional stress like I'd never felt before, I drifted to sleep in her cold, comforting and loving arms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I took a long time writing this one because I was traveling this past weekend and it had me stressing not being able to write. I missed it, even though I was gone from it for a short time. Anyway, I hope you guys enjoyed it. Thank you for reading. 
> 
> -Mar


	15. The Cullens

I woke up to the soft sunlight of another cloudy day. I turned over in my bed, away from the light, and hoping for sleep to take me again. But my brain kept poking at my lazily, until eventually I remembered the events that happened just yesterday, and my eyes snapped open.

"Fuck!" my head began to spin as I sat up too quickly.

"Your hair looks like a bird's nest." Her amused voice came from the rocking chair in the corner. "It's cute."

I laughed as my eyes found her.

She sat crossed-legged in the chair, a happy smile on her beautiful face.

"You stayed." I smiled at her, happy to wake up to her.

"Of course. That's what you wanted, correct?"

I nodded.

She smiled wider, dimples sinking into her cheeks. "It's what I wanted, too."

I stumbled out of bed, and slowly made my way too her. As I neared her, her arms opened wide and I hell into her lap. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes as her arms locked themselves around my waist. 

"Where's my dad?" I asked. 

"He left an hour ago, with an amazing amount of gear."

He'd be gone all day. So, it was just me and Edythe, in my empty house, with no need to go anywhere. So much time to be with each other. 

It was only then that I realized she'd changed her clothes. Yesterdays clothes were replaced by a baby pink sweater and blue jeans. I ran my hand up the sleeves. So soft. 

"You left?" I asked.

She opened her eyes and smiled, putting one of her hands up to my face. "I could hardly leave in the clothes I came in—what would the neighbors think? In any case, I was only gone for a few minutes and you were very deeply asleep at that point, so I know I didn't miss anything."

I groaned. "What did I say?"

Her eyes got a little wider, her face more vulnerable. "You said you loved me," she whispered.

"You already knew that."

"It was different, hearing the words."

I stared into her eyes. "I love you," I said.

She leaned into me and rested her forehead carefully against mine. "You are my life now."

We sat like that for a long time, until finally my stomach grumbled. She tapped my tight, telling me to get up, then she sat up laughing.

"Breakfast time?" she smiled, taking my hand in hers.

I gasped as I threw my free hand over my jugular, my eyes wide and scared.

She flinched; then her eyes narrowed, and she scowled at me.

I laughed. "Come on, you know that was funny."

She was still frowning. "I disagree. Shall I rephrase? Breakfast time for the human?"

"Okay. But I need a second first,"

"Okay."

"Stay." I pointed a finger at her.

She smiled.

I brushed my teeth, then rushed through my shower. Then I spent close to forty minutes washing and untangling the mess that was my hair. My heart stopped when I got out and realized I hadn't brought clothes with me.

No big deal, I'll just go get them in my room where the girl that I've dreamt of being naked with was. I rolled my eyes at myself as I wrapped a towel around my body and stomped out of the bathroom to my room. 

Edythe's eyes were wide when she saw me standing there with a red face and only a towel. 

"Um... I forgot my clothes."

She laughed at my expression.

"Shall we meet in the kitchen, then?"

"Yes, please."

She passed me in a rush of cool air, down the stairs before a second had passed. I was barely able to follow the motion—she was just a streak of pale color, then nothing.

I hurried to my dresser.

I threw some jeans on and the first shirt I saw before grabbing my hoodie and throwing it on. This way, she wouldn't worry about me getting cold. Then I ran down stairs.

She was leaning against the counter, looking very at home. I found myself enjoying the way she looked in my house. 

"What's for breakfast?" I asked, grinning.

Her eyebrows pulled together before her eyes widened and began looking around. "I'm not sure.... What would you like?"

I laughed, "How about you just sit and watch me hunt?"

I got a bowl and a box of cereal. She returned to the chair she'd sat in last night, watching as I poured the milk and grabbed a spoon. I set my food on the table, then paused. The empty space in front of her on the table made me feel rude.

"Um, can I... get you anything?" I laughed.

A smile played on her face as she rolled her eyes. "Just eat, Bella."

I sat at the table, watching her as I took a bite. She was gazing at me, studying my every movement. It made me self-conscious. I swallowed so I could speak, wanting to distract her.

"So, I wanted to talk to you about something," 

"What is it?" she asked curiously.

"Well, I'm still kind of uneasy about the fact that you were in my room... you know without me knowing." 

Edythe sighed, "Not my proudest moment, I'm very sorry about that. It was really a moment of weakness, and there's really no excuse for it,"

I nodded.

"I felt kind of... gross after. All my life, as a human and specially as a vampire I've felt men's eyes watching me as I walked down the street. Follow me, home. I heard their disgusting thoughts, and in that moment, I felt no better than them." 

I nodded, understanding her feeling, "Men are gross. And I forgive you, I just wanted to clear that up, it didn't sit right with me."

She smiled shyly, "Thank you for your forgiveness,"

"So, what are we up to today?" 

"Maybe," she said. "That depends on whether or not you like my idea."

"Let's hear it," I said taking another bite.

She pursed her lips. "Are you open to meeting my family?"

I choked on my cereal.

She jumped up, one hand stretched toward me helplessly, probably thinking about how she could crush my lungs if she tried to give me the Heimlich. I shook my head and motioned for her to sit while I coughed the milk out of my windpipe.

"I'm good, I'm good," I said when I could speak.

"Please don't do that to me again, Bella."

"Trust me, I didn't mean to,"

"Maybe we should have this conversation after you're done eating." 

"Okay." I needed a minute anyway.

She was apparently serious. And I guess I'd already met Archie and it hadn't been that bad, I also kind of met Emmett, he was cool about me almost bumping into him. And Dr. Cullen, too. But that had been back before I'd known Dr. Cullen was a vampire, which changed things. And while I had known with Archie and Emmett, I didn't know if they knew that I knew, and that felt like kind of an important distinction to me. Also, Archie was the most supportive, according to Edythe.

There were others who were obviously not as generous.

"I've finally done it," she murmured when I swallowed the last bite and pushed the bowl away.

"What did you do?"

"Scared you."

I thought about that for a moment, then held up my hand, fingers spread, and waved it from side to side in the international symbol for kinda, yeah.

"I wouldn't let anyone hurt you," she assured me.

But that just made me worry more that someone—Rosalie—would want to, and she would get in between to rescue me. I didn't care what she said about holding her own and not fighting fair, that idea really worried me.

"No one would try, Bella, that was a joke."

"I don't want to cause you any problems or unnecessary drama. Do they even know that I know?"

She nodded, laughing once, "Oh, they're quite up to date. It's not really possible to keep secrets in my house, what with our various parlor tricks. Archie had already seen that your dropping by was a possibility."

I could feel a variety of expressions rippling across my face before I could control it. What all did Archie see? Yesterday... last night... My face got hot.

I saw her eyes narrow the way they did when she was trying to read my mind.

"Just thinking about what Archie might have seen," I explained before she could ask.

She nodded. "It can feel invasive. But he doesn't do it on purpose. And he sees so many different possibilities... he doesn't know which will happen. For example, he saw over a hundred different ways that yesterday could have gone, and you only survived about seventy-five percent of the scenarios." Her voice got very hard at the last part, her posture brittle. "They'd taken bets, you know, as to whether I would kill you."

"That's fucked up," I shook my head.

Her expression was still rigid. "Do you want to know who sided for and against?"

"Maybe tell me after I meet the... I don't want to go in with any prejudices."

Surprise erased the anger from her face. "Oh. You'll go, then?"

"It seems like... the respectful thing to do. I don't want them to think I'm shady."

She laughed, a long, bell-like peal. I couldn't help but smile.

"Does that mean I get to meet Charlie, too, then?" she asked eagerly. "He's already suspicious, and I'd rather not be shady, either."

"Sure, but what should we tell him? I mean, how do I explain...?"

She shrugged. "I doubt he'll struggle too hard with the idea of your having a girlfriend. Though it's a loose interpretation of the word girl, I'll admit."

"Girlfriend," I mumbled. "That somehow sounds not enough," like she deserved a better tittle.

She stroked one finger down the side of my face. "Well, I don't know if we need to give him all the gory details, but he will need some explanation for why I'm around here so much. I don't want Chief Swan putting a restraining order on me."

"So, you'll stay?" I smiled, leaning into her hand that had molded to cup my face.

"As long as you want me."

"I'll always want you," I warned her. "I'm talking about forever here."

She put her fingers against my lips, and her eyes closed. It was almost like she wished I hadn't said that.

"Does that make you... sad?" I asked, trying to put a name to the expression on her face. Sad seemed closest.

Her eyes opened slowly. She didn't answer, she just stared into my eyes for a long time. Finally, she sighed.

"Shall we?"

I glanced at the clock on the wall automatically. "Isn't it a little ear—wait, forget I asked that."

"Forgotten."

"Is this okay?" I wondered, gesturing to my clothes. Should I dress up more?

"You look..." She suddenly dimpled up. "Delicious."

I giggled embarrassingly, "So, you're saying I should change?"

She laughed and shook her head. "Never change, Bella."

Then she stood and took a step toward me, so that her knees were pressed against mine. She put her hands on either side of my face and leaned down till her face was just an inch from mine.

"Carefully," she reminded me in a whisper.

She tilted her head to the side and closed the distance between us. With the lightest pressure, her lips touched mine.

Carefully, my hands slowly moved to her waist as my lips moved with hers. Carefully, I stood from my seat and she allowed me to. Breaking away from me to look me in the eyes, smiling before, carefully, capturing my lips again. 

Slowly, her lips moved against mine. As she got surer of herself, her lips were firmer. I felt them part slightly, and her breath washed cool across my mouth. I didn't inhale. I knew how her scent made me do stupid things. 

Her fingers stroked from my temples to my chin, and then hooked under my jaw and pulled my lips tighter to hers. Her tongue licked at my bottom lip and I was sure I tasted heaven. 

Careful! I shouted at myself.

And then, out of nowhere, the dizzy, hollow ringing sound started up in my ears. At first, I couldn't concentrate on anything but her lips, but then I started to fall down the tunnel and her lips were getting farther and farther away.

"Bella? Bella?"

"Hey," I tried to say.

"What happened? Are you all right?" The sound of her anxiety helped bring me around. I wasn't totally gone, so it was fairly easy. I took two deep breaths and opened my eyes.

"I'm fine," I told her. She was leaning away, but her arms were stretched out to me; one hand was cold on my forehead, the other on the back of my neck. Her face looked paler than usual. "Just... kind of forgot to breathe for a minute there. Sorry." I took another deep breath.

She eyed me doubtfully. "You forgot to breathe?"

"I was trying to be careful! Plus, I forget everything when you kiss me like that,"

Suddenly she was laughing, but she was clearly not amused. "What am I supposed to do with you, Bella? Yesterday, I kiss you, and you attack me! Today, you pass out!"

I get her a sheepish look, "Oops?"

She sighed deeply, then darted in to kiss my forehead. "It's a good thing that it's physically impossible for me to have a heart attack," she grumbled.

"That is good," I agreed, "Wish I could say the same for myself,"

"I can't take you anywhere like this."

"No, I'm fine, really. Totally back to normal. Besides, your family is going to think I'm insane anyway, so what's the difference if I'm a little unsteady?"

She frowned, raising an eyebrow. "You mean more unsteady than usual?"

"Okay, why drag me? Let's go."

She shook her head but took my hand, leading the way out of my house.

This time she didn't even ask, she just headed straight for the driver's side of my truck. I figured there was no point in arguing since I had no idea where she lived.

She drove respectfully, without any complaints about what my truck could handle. She took us north out of town, over the bridge at the Calawah River, and continued till we were past all the houses and on to close-packed trees. I was starting to wonder how far we were going when she abruptly steered right onto an unpaved road. The turnoff was unmarked, and almost totally hidden by thick ferns. The trees leaned close on both sides, so you could only see a few yards ahead before the road twisted out of sight.

We drove down this road for a least a few miles, mostly east. I was trying to fit this lane into the vague map I had in my head, not very successfully, when there was suddenly some thinning of the forest. She drove into a meadow... or was it a lawn? It didn't get much brighter, though. There were six enormous cedars—maybe the biggest trees I'd ever seen—whose branches shaded an entire acre. They pushed right up against the house in the middle of the lawn—hiding it.

I don't know what I expected, but it definitely wasn't this. The house was probably a hundred years old, three stories high and kind of... graceful, if that word could be applied to a house. It was painted a soft, faded white and all the windows and doors looked original, but they were probably in too good shape for that to be true. My truck was the only car in sight. When Edythe shut off the engine, I could hear the sound of a river somewhere close by.

"Wow."

"You like it?"

"It's beautiful."

Suddenly she was outside my door. I opened it slowly, starting to feel the nerves I'd been trying to suppress.

"Are you ready?"

"Nope. Let's do this."

She laughed, and I tried to laugh with her, but the sound seemed to get stuck in my throat. I grabbed a curl from my hair and began nervously twirling it.

"You look great," she said, then took my hand casually, like she didn't even have to think about it anymore. It wasn't a big thing, but it distracted me—made me feel just a little bit less panicky.

We walked through the deep shade up to the porch. I knew she could feel my tension. She reached across her body to put her free hand on my forearm for a second. Then she opened the front door and walked inside, towing me behind her.

The inside was even less like what I was expecting than the outside. It was very bright, very open, and very big. It must have started out as several rooms, but most of the walls had been removed from the first floor to create one wide space. The back, south-facing wall had been entirely replaced with glass. Past the cedars the lawn was open, and it stretched down to a wide river. A massive staircase dominated the west side of the room. The walls, the high ceiling, the wooden floors, and the thick carpets were all different shades of white.

Just to the left of the front door was a raised step, on the center stood a spectacular grand piano, it was also white and completely beautiful. Edythe led us toward the opened door behind it where I could smell something new, like eggs, bacon. It smelled delicious and my stomach growl softly. 

Edythe turned to smile at me as we walked through the door and stood in the middle of the kitchen. Where her mothers stood around, cooking with Emmett.

"Bella, welcome!" Esme—the only one of the family I had never met— smiled warmly at me. Offering her hand as we neared the kitchen island. 

I shook it, smiling back. There was something kind about her face, something that made me feel at home. Something that reminded me of my own mother. 

"Hello, it's nice to meet you," I was surprised at how shy my voice sounded. 

"We're making breakfast for you," she stated, looking back at her wife and son.

Emmett looked up from his work, which consisted of him chopping up and onion. He grinned and waved hello at me with his large knife, I couldn't help but chuckle. Carine separated herself from the stove, leaning over to shake my hand.

"You're giving us an excuse to use the kitchen for the first time," she grinned. 

"Oh, it smells really good,"

"She already ate," Edythe spoke, beside and I looked at her.

"Babe, that is bacon. Don't get between me and bacon, I won't choose you," I said, my face flushed as I realized I called her babe.

Edythe chuckled, raising her free hand up, "Sorry, sorry,"

I turned back to Esme, Carine had gone back to her place behind the stove, "I would love to try your food,"

Esme gave me the warmest smile I had ever received and retreated back into the kitchen as Emmett stepped forward to join us. 

"Hello, little one, good to see you still alive," He greeted as he reached for my hair before being stopped by Edythe.

"Emmett," She warned.

"I'm guessing he's one of the ones that bet that you would kill me," I laughed.

Edythe looked at me, her eyes wide with surprise, as Emmett's laughed boomed through the kitchen. 

"Where are Archie and Jess?" Edythe asked.

No one answered, because they'd just appeared on the other side of the room, where the dining room was.

"Hey, Edy's home!" Archie called, and then he streaked through the room, just a blur of pale skin, coming to a sudden stop right in front of us. I saw Carine and Esme shoot warning glances at him, but I kind of liked it. It was natural for him—how they moved when they didn't have to worry about strangers watching.

"Bella!" he greeted me, enthusiastic like we were old friends. His arms stretched out wide as he pulled me in for a hug. I felt extremely tiny in his arms, my head reached his shoulder and he had to slouch slightly in order to hug me properly. I wrapped my arms around him as I returned the hug.

"Hey, Archie," I said as he let go; my voice sounded winded. I was shocked, but also a little pleased that he really did seem supportive—more than that, like he already liked me.

When he stepped back, I saw that I wasn't the only one who was shocked. Carine and Esme were watching my face with wide eyes, like they were waiting for me to make a run for it. Edythe's jaw was locked, but I couldn't tell if she was worried or mad.

"You do smell good, I never noticed before," Archie commented. 

I blushed, chuckling. "Thanks, I guess?" 

"My turn!" Emmett shoved Archie out of the way and engulfed me in a huge bear like hug, lifting me off the ground before setting me back down.

Edythe looked annoyed as fuck when I looked back at her. "This is not what being careful looks like,"

Her brothers laughed at her. 

Then Jasper was there. Edythe had compared herself to a hunting lion, which was hard for me to picture, but I could easily picture Jasper that way. There was something like a lion about him now, when he was just standing there. But despite that, I was suddenly totally comfortable. It felt like I was in my own place surrounded by people I knew well. Easy—kind of like when Jacob or dad were around. It was strange to feel that here, and then I remembered what Edythe had told me about what Jasper could do. That was weird to think about. It didn't feel like someone was using magic or whatever on me.

"Hello, Bella," Jasper said. He didn't approach or offer to shake my hand, but it didn't feel awkward.

"Hello, Jasper." I smiled at him, and then the others. "It's nice to meet you all—you have a very beautiful home," I added conventionally.

"Thank you," Esme said, joining us with a look of awe on her face. "We're so glad that you came." She spoke with feeling, and I realized that she thought I was brave.

She held a plate in her hand, a delicious and beautifully made omelet sat on it with a few pieces of bacon. She grabbed my free hand and led me to the dining room, Edythe dropped my hand and I felt lost until I sat down on the wooden dinner table and found her already in her place next to me.

I noticed Carine gazing meaningfully at Edythe with a pretty intense expression. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Edythe nod just slightly.

I felt like I was eavesdropping, so I looked away. To the plate that Esme had set in front of me, she sat on the other side of me while all the others joined around the table. Jasper sat farthest away, Archie seemed like he wanted to switch with Esme and Carine commanded the other end of the table as Emmett sat grinning next to her. there was only one empty chair and then I realized Rosalie was missing.

They all looked at me as I took my first bite of the cheesy omelet, feeling a bit awkward.

I hummed when the burst of flavors entered my mouth, "This is delicious, oh my god,"

Esme beamed, "I'm so pleased you like it,"

"I'm surprised something that smells like shit tastes good," Emmett laughed.

Carine sighed, shaking her head.

"So, where's vampire Barbie?" I raised an eyebrow at Emmett, who's grin never disappeared. 

"I like her, don't eat her yet, Edythe,"

Edythe rolled her eyes, as Archie spoke, "Don't worry, I haven't seen that happening today."

I kept eating, enjoying my time around this amazing family, surprised at how much I felt at home here. Soon, I had finished, and Emmett had disappeared.

We were back at the front of the house, by the grand piano that I kept looking at.

Esme noticed my stare.

"Do you play?" she asked.

I shook my head. "Not at all. But it's really beautiful. Is it yours?"

"No," she laughed. "Didn't Edythe tell you she was musical?"

"Uh, she hasn't mentioned it. But I guess I should have known, right?"

Esme raised her eyebrows, confused.

"Is there anything she's not good at?" I asked rhetorically.

Jasper barked out a laugh, Archie rolled his eyes, and Esme gave Edythe a very motherly look, which was impressive considering how young she seemed.

"I hope you haven't been showing off," she said. "It's rude."

"Oh, just a little bit." Edythe laughed—the sound was infectious, and everyone smiled, including me. Esme smiled the widest, though, and she and Edythe shared a brief look.

"Edythe, you should play for him," Esme said.

"You just said showing off was rude."

"Make an exception." she smiled at me. "I'm being selfish. She doesn't play enough, and I love to hear her."

"I'd like to hear you play," I told her.

She gave Esme a long, exasperated look, then turned the same look on me. When that was done, she dropped my hand and walked up to sit on the bench. She patted the spot next to her and then looked back at me.

"Oh," I mumbled, and went to join her.

As soon as I sat down, her fingers started flowing across the keys, filling the room with a piece so complex and full it was impossible to believe only one person was playing. My mouth fell open in shock, and I heard chuckling behind me.

Edythe looked at me casually while the music surged around us without a break. "Do you like it?"

I got it immediately. Of course. "You wrote this."

She nodded. "I wrote it for Esme."

I sighed.

"What's wrong?"

"I'm just wondering if you wrote something... about me."

She thought about that for a minute, and then the music changed slowly into something softer... something familiar. It was the lullaby she'd hummed to me, only a thousand times more intricate.

"I thought of this one," she said quietly, "when I realized I was falling in love with you. It's your song."

The song turned even softer and sweeter. I couldn't speak.

Then her voice was normal again. "They like you quite a bit, you know. Esme especially."

I glanced behind me, and the big room was empty.

"Where did they go?"

"Giving us some privacy. Subtle, aren't they?"

I laughed, then frowned. "It's nice that they like me. I like them. But Rosalie..."

Her expression tightened. "Don't worry about Rosalie. She's always the last to come around."

"Did Emmett go to her?"

She laughed sharply. "He's off trying to reason with Rosalie now."

"What did I do?" I had to ask. "I mean, I've never even spoken to—"

"You didn't do anything, Bella, honestly. Rosalie struggles the most with what we are. It's hard for her to have someone on the outside know the truth. And she's a little jealous."

"Of what?"

She shrugged. "You're human. She wishes she were, too."

That caught me off guard. "Oh."

I listened to the music, my music. It kept changing and evolving, but the heart of it stayed the same. I wasn't sure how she did it. She didn't seem to be paying much attention to her hands.

"That thing Jasper does feels really... not strange, I guess. It was kind of incredible."

She laughed. "Words don't fully do it justice, do they?"

"Not really. But... does he like me? He seemed..."

"That was my fault. I told you he was the most recent to try our way of life. I warned him to keep him distance."

"Oh, hm."

"Indeed."

I worked hard not to shudder.

"Carine and Esme think you're wonderful," she told me.

"Huh. I really didn't do anything very exciting. Shook a few hands."

"They're happy to see me happy. Esme probably wouldn't care if you had a third eye and webbed feet. All this time she's been worrying about me, afraid I was too young when Carine changed me, that there was something missing from my essential makeup. She's so relieved. Every time I touch you, she practically bursts into applause."

"Archie's enthusiastic."

She made a face. "Archie has his own special perspective on life."

I looked at her for a moment, weighing her expression.

"What?" she asked.

"You're not going to explain what you mean by that, are you?"

Her eyes narrowed as she stared back at me, and a moment of wordless communication passed between us—almost like what I'd seen between her and Carine before, except without the benefit of mind reading. I knew she wasn't telling me something about Archie, something her attitude toward him had been hinting at for a long time. And she knew that I knew, but she wasn't going to give anything away. Not now.

"Okay," I said, like we'd spoken all that out loud.

"Hmm," she said.

And because I'd just thought of it... "So, what was Carine telling you before?"

She was looking at the keys now. "You noticed that, did you?"

I shrugged. "Of course."

She stared at me thoughtfully for a moment before she answered. "She wanted to tell me some news. She didn't know if it was something, I would share with you."

"Will you?"

"It's probably a good idea. My behavior might be a little... odd for the next few days—or weeks. A little maniacal. So, it's best if I explain myself beforehand."

"What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong, exactly. Archie just sees some visitors coming soon. They know we're here, and they're curious."

"Visitors?"

"Yes... like us, but not. Their hunting habits are not like ours; I mean. They probably won't come into town at all, but I won't be letting you out of my sight till they're gone."

"Wow. Shouldn't we... I mean, is there a way to warn people?"

Her face was serious and sad. "Carine will ask them not to hunt nearby, as a courtesy, and most likely they won't have a problem with that. But we can't do more, for a variety of reasons." She sighed. "They won't be hunting here, but they'll be hunting somewhere. That's just how things are when you live in a world with monsters."

I shivered.

"Finally, a rational response," she murmured. "I was beginning to think you had no sense of self-preservation at all."

I let that one pass, looking away, my eyes wandering again around the big white room.

"It's not what you expected, is it?" she asked, and her voice was amused again.

"No," I admitted.

"No coffins, no piled skulls in the corners; I don't even think we have cobwebs... what a disappointment this must be for you."

I ignored her teasing. "I didn't expect it to be so light and so... open."

She was more serious when she answered. "It's the one place we never have to hide."

My song drifted to an end, the final chords shifting to a melancholier key. The last note lingered for a long moment, and something about the sound of that single note was so sad that a lump formed in my throat.

I cleared it out, then said, "Thank you."

It seemed like the music had affected her, too. She stared searchingly at me for a long moment, and then she shook her head and sighed.

"Would you like to see the rest of the house?" she asked.

"Will there be piled skulls in any corners?"

"Sorry to disappoint."

"Well, okay, but my expectations are pretty low now."

We walked up the wide staircase hand in hand. My free hand trailed along the satin-smooth rail. The hall at the top of the stairs was paneled in wood the same pale color as the floorboards.

She gestured as we passed the doors. "Rosalie and Emmett's room... Carine's office... Archie's room..."

She would have continued, but I stopped dead at the end of the hall, staring with raised eyebrows at the ornament hanging on the wall above my head. Edythe laughed at my expression.

"Ironic, I know," she said.

"It must be very old," I guessed. I kind of wanted to touch it, to see if the dark patina was as silky as it looked, but I could tell it was pretty valuable.

She shrugged. "Early sixteen-thirties, more or less."

I looked away from the cross to stare at her.

"Why do you have this here?"

"Nostalgia. It belonged to Carine's father."

"He collected antiques?"

"No. He carved this himself. It hung on the wall above the pulpit in the vicarage where he preached."

I turned back to stare at the cross while I did the mental math. The cross was over three hundred and seventy years old. The silence stretched on as I struggled to wrap my mind around the concept of so many years.

"Are you all right?" she asked.

"How old is Carine?" I asked quietly, still staring up.

"She just celebrated her three hundred and sixty-second birthday," Edythe said. She watched my expression carefully as she continued, and I tried to pull it together. "Carine was born in London in the sixteen-forties, she believes. Time wasn't marked as accurately then, for the common people anyway. It was just before Cromwell's rule, though."

The name pulled up a few disjointed facts in my head, from a World History class I'd had last year. I should have paid more attention.

"She was the only daughter of an Anglican pastor. Her mother died in childbirth. Her father was... a hard man. Driven. He believed very strongly in the reality of evil. He led hunts for witches, werewolves... and vampires."

It was strange how the word shifted things, made the story sound less like a history lesson.

"They burned a lot of innocent people—of course, the real creatures that he sought were not so easy to catch.

"Carine did what she could to protect those innocents. She was always a believer in the scientific method, and she tried to convince her father to look past superstition to true evidence. He discouraged her involvement. He did love her, and those who defended monsters were often lumped in with them.

"Her father was persistent... and obsessive. Against the odds, he tracked some evidence of real monsters. Carine begged him to be careful, and he listened, to an extent. Rather than charge in blindly, he waited and watched for a long time. He spied on a coven of true vampires who lived in the city sewers, only coming out by night to hunt. In those days, when monsters were not just myths and legends, that was the way many lived.

"His people gathered their pitchforks and torches, of course"—she laughed darkly—"and waited where the pastor had seen the monsters exit into the street. There were two access points. The pastor and a few of his men poured a vat of burning pitch into one, while the others waited beside the second for the monsters to emerge."

I realized I was holding my breath again and made myself exhale.

"Nothing happened. They waited a long time, and then left disappointed. The pastor was angry—there must have been other exits, and the vampires had obviously fled in fear. Of course, the men with their crude spears and axes weren't any kind of danger to a vampire, but he didn't know that. Now that they were warned, how would he ever find his monsters again?"

Her voice got lower. "It wasn't hard. He must have annoyed them. Vampires can't afford notoriety, or these probably would have simply massacred the entire mob. Instead, one of them followed him home.

"Carine remembers the night clearly—for a human memory. It was the kind of thing that would stick in your mind. Her father came home very late, or rather very early. Carine had waited up, worried. He was furious, ranting and raving about his loss. Carine tried to calm him, but he ignored her. And then there was a man in the middle of their small room.

"Carine says he was ragged, dressed like a beggar, but his face was beautiful, and he spoke in Latin. Because of her father's vocation and her own curiosity, Carine was unusually educated for a woman in those days—she understood what the man said. He told her father that he was a fool and he would pay for the damage he had caused. The preacher threw himself in front of his daughter to protect her....

"I often wonder about that moment. If he hadn't revealed what he loved most, would all our stories have changed?"

She was thoughtful for a few seconds, and then she continued. "The vampire smiled. He told the preacher, 'Go to your hell knowing this—that what you love will become all that you hate.'

"He tossed the preacher to the side and grabbed Carine—"

She'd seemed lost in the story, but now she stopped short. Her eyes came back to the present, and she looked at me like she'd said something wrong. Or maybe she thought she'd upset me.

"What happened?" I whispered.

When she spoke, it was like she was choosing each word carefully. "He made sure that the preacher knew what would happen to Carine, and then he killed the preacher very slowly while Carine watched, writhing in pain and horror."

I recoiled. She nodded in sympathy.

"The vampire left. Carine knew her fate if someone found her in this condition. Anything infected by the monster would have to be destroyed. She acted instinctively to save her own life. Despite the pain she was in, she crawled into the cellar and buried herself in a pile of rotting potatoes for three days. It's a miracle she was able to keep silent, to stay undiscovered.

"It was over then, and she realized what she had become."

I wasn't sure what my face was doing, but she suddenly broke off again.

"How are you feeling?" she asked.

"I'm good—what happened next?"

She half-smiled at my intensity, then turned back down the hall, pulling me with her.

"Come on, then," she said. "I'll show you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Emmett's knife wave is the best part of Twilight (2008)


	16. Carine

She led be back down to the room she had pointed out to be Carine's office, where She paused outside the door for a second.

"Come in," Carine called from inside.

Edythe opened the door to a tall room with long windows that stretched the entire height of the walls. The room was lined by bookshelves reaching to the ceiling and holding more books than I'd ever seen outside a library.

Carine sat behind a huge desk; she was just placing a bookmark in the pages of the book she held. The room was how I'd always imagined a college dean's would look—only Carine looked too young to fit the part.

Knowing what she'd been through—having just watched it all in my imagination while knowing that my imagination wasn't up to the job and it was probably much worse than I'd pictured it—made me look at her differently.

"What can I do for you?" she asked with a smile, rising from her seat.

"I wanted to show Bella some of our history," Edythe said. "Well, your history, actually."

"We didn't mean to disturb you," I apologized.

"Not at all," she said to me, and then to Edythe, "Where are you going to start?"

"The Waggoner," Edythe said. She pulled me around in a circle, so that we were facing the door we'd just walked through.

This wall was different from the others. Instead of bookshelves, it was covered by dozens and dozens of framed paintings. They were all different sizes and styles, some dull, some blazing with color. I scanned quickly, looking for some kind of logic, something they all had in common, but I couldn't find any link.

Edythe pulled me to the far left side, then put both her hands on my arms and positioned me directly in front of one of the paintings. My heart reacted the way it always did when she touched me—even in the most casual way. It was more embarrassing knowing Carine would hear it, too.

The painting she wanted me to look at was a small square canvas in a plain wooden frame; it did not stand out among the bigger and brighter pieces. Painted in different shades of brown, it showed a miniature city full of steeply slanted roofs. A river filled the foreground, crossed by a bridge covered with structures that looked like tiny cathedrals.

"London in the sixteen-fifties," Edythe said.

"The London of my youth," Carine added from a few feet behind us. I jumped a little—I hadn't heard her approach. Edythe took my hand and squeezed it lightly.

"Will you tell the story?" Edythe asked. I turned to see Carine's reaction.

She met my glance and smiled. "I would, but I'm actually running a bit late. The hospital called this morning—Dr. Snow is taking a sick day. But Bella won't miss anything." She smiled at Edythe now. "You know the stories as well as I do."

It was a strange combination to absorb—the everyday life of a small-town doctor mixed up with a discussion of her early days in seventeenth-century London.

It was also kind of unsettling to realize that she probably was only speaking out loud for my benefit.

With another warm smile, Carine left the room.

I stared at the picture of her hometown for a long minute.

"What came next?" I asked again. "When she knew what had happened to her?"

She nudged me over a half-step, her eyes on a bigger landscape. It was done in dull fall colors and showed an empty meadow in a gloomy forest, a black mountain peak in the distance.

"When she knew what she had become," Edythe said quietly, "she despaired... and then rebelled. She tried to destroy herself. But that's not easily done."

"How?" I didn't mean to say that out loud, but I was so shocked, it slipped out.

Edythe shrugged. "She jumped from great heights. She tried to drown herself in the ocean. But she was young to the new life, and very strong. It is amazing that she was able to resist... feeding... while she was still so new. The instinct is more powerful then, it takes over everything. But she was so repelled by herself that she had the strength to try to kill herself with starvation."

"Is that possible?" I asked quietly.

"No, there are very few ways we can be killed."

I opened my mouth to ask, but she spoke before I could.

"So she grew very hungry, and eventually weak. She strayed as far as she could from the human populace, recognizing that her willpower was weakening, too. For months she wandered by night, seeking the loneliest places, loathing herself.

"One night, a herd of deer passed beneath her hiding place. She was so wild with thirst that she attacked without a thought. Her strength returned and she realized there was an alternative to being the vile monster she feared. Had she not eaten venison in her former life? Over the next months, her new philosophy was born. She could exist without being a demon. She found herself again.

"She began to make better use of her time. She'd always been intelligent, eager to learn. Now she had unlimited time before her. She studied by night, planned by day. She swam to France and—"

"She swam to France?"

"People swim the Channel all the time, Bella," she reminded me with a patient smile. 

"That's true, I guess. It just sounded funny in that context. Go on."

"Swimming is easy for us—"

"Everything is easy for you," I muttered.

She waited with her eyebrows raised.

"Sorry. I won't interrupt again, I promise."

She smiled, shaking her head at me before finishing her sentence. "Because, technically, we don't need to breathe."

"You—"

"No, no, you promised," she laughed, placing her cold finger against my lips. "Do you want to hear the story or not?"

"You can't spring something like that on me, and then expect me not to say anything," I mumbled against her finger.

She lifted her hand, moving it to rest against my hip. The speed of my heart reacted to that, but I ignored it.

"You don't have to breathe?" I demanded.

"No, it's not necessary. Just a habit." She shrugged.

"How long can you go... without breathing?"

"Indefinitely, I suppose; I don't know. It gets a bit uncomfortable—being without a sense of smell."

"A bit uncomfortable," I echoed.

I wasn't paying attention to my own expression, but something in it made her suddenly serious. Her hand fell to her side and she stood very still, watching my face. The silence stretched out. Her features turned to stone.

"What is it?" I whispered, carefully touching her frozen face.

Her face came back to life, and she smiled a tiny, wan smile. "I know that at some point, something I tell you or something you see is going to be too much. And then you'll run away from me, screaming as you go." Her smile faded. "I won't stop you when that happens. I want it to happen, because I want you to be safe. And yet, I want to be with you. The two desires are impossible to reconcile...." She trailed off, staring at my face.

"I'm not running anywhere," I promised, grabbing her hand. 

"We'll see," she said, smiling again.

I frowned at her. "Back to the story—Carine was swimming to France."

She paused, settling into the story again. Reflexively, her eyes flickered to another picture—the most colorful of them all, the most ornately framed, and the largest; it was twice as wide as the door it hung next to. The canvas overflowed with bright figures in swirling robes, writhing around long pillars and off marbled balconies. I couldn't tell if it represented Greek mythology, or if the characters floating in the clouds above were meant to be biblical.

"Carine swam to France, and continued on through Europe, to the universities there. By night she studied music, science, medicine—and found her calling, her penance, in that, in saving human lives." Her expression became reverent. "I can't adequately describe the struggle; it took Carine two centuries of torturous effort to perfect her self-control. Now she is all but immune to the scent of human blood, and she is able to do the work she loves without agony. She finds a great deal of peace there, at the hospital...." Edythe stared off into space for a long moment. Suddenly she seemed to remember the story. She tapped her finger against the huge painting in front of us.

"She was studying in Italy when she discovered the others there. They were much more civilized and educated than the wraiths of the London sewers."

She pointed up to a comparatively dignified group of figures painted on the highest balcony, looking down calmly on the mayhem below them. I looked carefully at the little assembly and realized, with a startled laugh, that I recognized the golden-haired woman standing off to one side.

"Solimena was greatly inspired by Carine's friends. He often painted them as gods." Edythe laughed. "Sulpicia, Marcus, and Athenodora," she said, indicating the other three. "Nighttime patrons of the arts."

The first woman and man were black-haired, the second woman was pale blond. All wore richly colored gowns, while Carine was painted in white.

"What about that one?" I asked, pointing to a small, nondescript girl with light brown hair and clothes. She was on her knees clinging to the other woman's skirts—the woman with the elaborate black curls.

"Mele," she said. "A... servant, I suppose you could call her. Sulpicia's little thief."

"What happened to them?" I wondered aloud, my fingertip hovering a centimeter from the figures on the canvas.

"They're still there." She shrugged. "As they have been for millennia. Carine stayed with them only for a short time, just a few decades. She admired their civility, their refinement, but they persisted in trying to cure her aversion to her natural food source, as they called it. They tried to persuade her, and she tried to persuade them, to no avail. Eventually, Carine decided to try the New World. She dreamed of finding others like herself. She was very lonely, you see.

"She didn't find anyone for a long time. But as monsters became the stuff of fairy tales, she found she could interact with unsuspecting humans as if she were one of them. She began working as a nurse—though her learning and skill exceeded that of the surgeons of the day, as a woman, she couldn't be accepted in another role. She did what she could to save patients from less able doctors when no one was looking. But though she worked closely with humans, the companionship she craved evaded her; she couldn't risk familiarity.

"When the influenza epidemic hit, she was working nights in a hospital in Chicago. She'd been turning over an idea in her mind for several years, and she had almost decided to act—since she couldn't find a companion, she would create one. She wasn't sure which parts of her own transformation were actually necessary, and which were simply for the enjoyment of her sadistic creator, so she was hesitant. And she was loath to steal anyone's life the way hers had been stolen. It was in that frame of mind that she found me. There was no hope for me; I was left in a ward with the dying. She had nursed my parents, my fiancé, and knew I was alone. She decided to try...."

Her voice, nearly a whisper now, trailed off. She stared unseeingly through the long windows. I wondered which images filled her mind now, Carine's memories or her own. I waited.

She turned back to me, smiling softly. "And now we've come full circle."

"So you've always been with Carine?"

"Almost always."

She took my hand again and pulled me back out into the hallway. I looked back toward the pictures I couldn't see anymore, wondering if I'd ever get to hear the other stories.

She didn't add anything as we walked down the hall, so I asked, "Almost?"

Edythe sighed, pursed her lips, and then looked up at me from the corner of her eye.

"You don't want to answer that, do you?" I said.

"It wasn't my finest hour."

We started up another flight of stairs.

"You can tell me anything. . . I wouldn't hold anything against you." I said. 

She paused when we got to the top of the stairs and stared into my eyes for a few seconds.

"I suppose I owe you that. You should know who I am."

I got the feeling that what she was saying now was directly connected to what she'd said before, about me running away screaming. I carefully set my face and braced myself.

She took a deep breath. "I had a typical bout of rebellious adolescence—about ten years after I was... born... created, whatever you want to call it. I wasn't sold on Carine's life of abstinence, and I resented her for curbing my appetite. So... I went off on my own for a time."

"Really?" This didn't shock me the way she thought it would. It only made me more curious.

"That doesn't repulse you?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I guess... it sounds reasonable."

She laughed one sharp laugh and then started pulling me forward again, through a hall similar to the one downstairs, walking slowly. "From the time of my new birth, I had the advantage of knowing what everyone around me was thinking, both human and non-human alike. That's why it took me ten years to defy Carine—I could read her perfect sincerity, understand exactly why she lived the way she did.

"It took me only a few years to return to Carine and recommit to her vision. I thought I would be exempt from the... depression... that accompanies a conscience. Because I knew the thoughts of my prey, I could pass over the innocent and pursue only the evil. If I followed a rapist down a dark alley where he stalked a young girl—if I saved her, then surely I wasn't so terrible."

I tried to imagine what she was describing. What would she have looked like, coming silent and pale out of the shadows? What would the rapist have thought when he saw her—perfect, beautiful, more than human? Would he even have known to be afraid? 

"But as time went on, I began to see the monster in my eyes. I couldn't escape the debt of so much human life taken, no matter how justified. And I went back to Carine and Esme. They welcomed me back like the prodigal. It was more than I deserved."

"In my opinion, you probably saved more lives than you took. You were somewhat of a vigilante, helping the innocent by getting rid of the guilty. The law, to this day, fails most victims." I was sure about my words. 

"Yes, but was it my job to play god?" 

We'd come to a stop in front of the last door in the hall.

"My room," she said, opening it and pulling me through.

Her room faced south, with a wall-sized window like the great room below. The whole back side of the house must be glass. Her view looked down on the wide, winding river, which I figured had to be the Sol Duc, and across the forest to the white peaks of the Olympic Mountain range. The mountains were much closer than I would have thought.

Her western wall was covered with shelf after shelf of CDs; the room was better stocked than a music store. In the corner was a sophisticated-looking sound system, the kind I was afraid to touch because I'd be sure to break something. There was no bed, only a deep black leather sofa. The floor was covered with a thick, silver-colored carpet, and the walls were upholstered with heavy fabric in a slightly darker shade.

"Good acoustics?" I guessed.

She laughed and nodded.

She picked up a remote and turned the stereo on. It was quiet, but the soft jazz number sounded like the band was in the room with us. I went to look at her mind-boggling music collection.

"How do you have these organized?" I asked, unable to find any rhyme or reason to the titles.

"Ummm, by year, and then by personal preference within that frame," she said absently.

I turned, and she was looking at me with an expression in her eyes that I couldn't read.

"What?"

"I was prepared to feel... relieved. Having you know about everything, not needing to keep secrets from you. But I didn't expect to feel more than that. I like it. It makes me... happy." She shrugged and smiled.

"I'm glad," I said, smiling back. I'd worried that she might regret telling me these things. It was good to know that wasn't the case.

But then, as her eyes dissected my expression, her smile faded and her eyebrows pulled together.

"You're still waiting for the running and the screaming, aren't you?" I asked, laughing. 

She nodded, fighting a smile.

"I really hate to burst your bubble, but you're just not as scary as you think you are. I honestly can't imagine being afraid of you," I said casually.

She raised her eyebrows, and then a slow smile started spreading across her face.

"You probably shouldn't have said that," she told me.

And then she growled—a low sound that ripped up the back of her throat and didn't sound human at all. Her smile got wider until it changed from a smile into a display of teeth. Her body shifted, and she was half-crouched, her back stretched long and curved in, like a cat tensed to pounce.

"Um... Edythe?"

I didn't see her attack—it was much too fast. I couldn't even understand what was happening. For half a second I was airborne and the room rolled around me, upside down and then right side up again. I didn't feel the landing, but suddenly I was on my back on the black couch and Edythe was on top of me, her knees tight against my hips, her hands planted on either side of my head so that I couldn't move, and her bared teeth just inches from my face. She made another soft noise that was halfway between a growl and a purr.

"Wow," I breathed, placing my hands on her hips. 

"You were saying?" she asked.

"Um, that you are a very, very terrifying monster?"

She grinned. "Much better."

"And that I am so completely in love with you."

Her face went soft, her eyes wide, all the walls down again.

"Bella," she whispered.

"Can we come in?" a low voice asked from the door.

I flinched and probably would have smacked my forehead against Edythe's if she hadn't been so much faster than I was. In another fraction of a second, she'd pulled me up so that I was sitting on the sofa and she was next to me, her legs draped over mine.

Archie stood in the doorway, Jasper behind him in the hall. Red started creeping up my neck, but Edythe was totally relaxed.

"Please," she said to Archie.

Archie didn't seem to have noticed that we were doing anything unusual. He walked to the center of the room and folded himself onto the floor in a motion so graceful it was kind of surreal. Jasper stayed by the door, and, unlike Archie, he looked a little shocked. She stared at Edythe's face, and I wondered what the room felt like to him.

"It sounded like you were having Bella for lunch," Archie smiled, "and we came to see if you would share."

I stiffened, caught off guard until I saw Edythe grin—whether because of Archie's comment or my reaction, I couldn't tell.

"Sorry," she replied, throwing a possessive arm around my neck. "I'm not in a mood to share."

Archie shrugged. "Fair enough."

"Actually," Jasper said, taking a hesitant step into the room, "Archie says there's going to be a real storm tonight, and Emmett wants to play ball. Are you game?"

The words were all normal, but I didn't quite understand the context. It sounded like Archie might be a little more reliable than the weatherman, though.

Edythe's eyes lit up, but she hesitated.

"Of course you should bring Bella," Archie said. I thought I saw Jasper throw a quick glance at him.

"Do you want to go?" Edythe asked. Her expression was so eager that I would have agreed to anything.

"Sure. Um, where are we going?"

"We have to wait for thunder to play ball—you'll see why," she promised.

"Should I bring an umbrella?"

All three of them laughed out loud.

"Should he?" Jasper asked Archie.

"No." Archie seemed positive. "The storm will hit over town. It'll be dry enough in the clearing."

"Good," Jasper said, and the enthusiasm in his voice was—unsurprisingly—catching. I found myself getting excited about the idea, though I wasn't even sure what it was.

"Let's call Carine and see if she's in," Archie said, and he was on his feet in another liquid movement that made me stare.

"Like you don't already know," Jasper teased, and then they were gone.

"So... what are we playing?" I asked.

"You will be watching," Edythe clarified. "We will be playing baseball."

I looked at her skeptically. "Vampires like baseball?"

She smiled at me. "It's the American pastime."


	17. The Game

The rain was just beginning to fall when Edythe turned up to my street. Up until that moment, I'd had no doubt that she'd be staying with me while I spent a few hours in the real world.

And then I saw the black, weathered sedan parked in Charlie's driveway—and heard Edythe mutter something angry underneath her breath.

Leaning away from the rain under the shallow front porch, Jacob stood behind his father's wheelchair. Billy's face was impassive as rock while Edythe parked my truck against the curb. Jacob stared down, looking mortified.

Edythe's low voice was furious. "This is crossing the line."

"He came to warn Charlie?" I guessed, more horrified than angry.

Edythe just nodded, answering Billy's stare with narrowed eyes.

At least Charlie wasn't home yet. Maybe the disaster could be averted.

"Let me deal with this," I suggested. Edythe's glare looked a little too... serious.

She nodded. "That's probably best. Be careful, though. The child has no idea."

"Child? You know, Jacob is not that much younger than I am."

She looked at me then, her anger gone. She grinned. "Oh, I know."

I sighed.

"Get them inside so I can leave," she told me. "I'll be back around dusk."

"You can take the truck," I offered.

She rolled her eyes. "I could walk home faster than this truck moves."

I didn't want to leave her. "You don't have to go."

She touched my frown and smiled. "Actually, I do. After you get rid of them"—she glared in the Blacks' direction—"you still have to prepare Charlie to meet your new girlfriend."

She laughed at my face—I guess she could see exactly how excited I was for that.

It wasn't that I didn't want Charlie to know about Edythe. I knew he liked the Cullen's, and how could he not like Edythe? He'd probably be insultingly impressed. But it just seemed like pushing my luck. Trying to drag this too-beautiful fantasy down into my ordinary life didn't feel safe. How could the two coexist for long?

"I'll be back soon," she promised. Her eyes flickered over to the porch, and then she darted in swiftly to press her lips to the side of my neck. My heart bounced around inside my ribs while I, too, glanced at the porch. Billy's face was no longer impassive, and his hands clutched at the armrests of his chair.

"Soon," I said as I opened my door and stepped out into the rain. I could feel her eyes on my back as I jogged to the porch.

"Hey, Jacob. Hi, Billy," I greeted them, as cheerfully as I could manage. "Charlie's gone for the day—I hope you haven't been waiting long."

"Not long," Billy said in a subdued tone. His dark eyes were piercing. "I just wanted to bring this up." He gestured to a brown paper sack resting on his lap.

"Thanks," I said automatically, though I had no idea what it could be. "Why don't you come in for a minute and dry off?"

I pretended I didn't notice his intense scrutiny as I unlocked the door and waved them inside ahead of me. Jacob gave me a half-smile as he walked by.

"Let me take that," I offered as I turned to shut the door. I exchanged one last look with Edythe—she was perfectly still as she waited, her eyes serious.

"You'll want to put that in the fridge," Billy instructed as he handed me the package. "It's a batch of Harry Clearwater's homemade fish fry. Charlie's favorite. The fridge keeps it drier."

"Thanks," I repeated with more emotion. "I was running out of ways to cook fish, and he's bound to bring more home tonight."

"Fishing again?" Billy asked. He was suddenly intent. "Down at the usual spot? Maybe I'll run by and see him."

"No," I lied quickly. "He was headed someplace new... but I have no idea where."

He stared at my face, his eyes narrowing. It was always so obvious when I tried to lie.

"Jake," he said, still eyeing me. "Why don't you go get that new picture of Aiyana out of the car? I'll leave that for Charlie, too."

"Where is it?" Jacob asked. His voice sounded kind of down. I glanced at him, but he was staring at the floor, his black brows pulling together.

"I think I saw it in the trunk," Billy said. "You may have to dig for it."

Jacob stalked back out into the rain.

Billy and I faced each other in silence. After a few seconds, the quiet started to feel awkward, so I turned and headed to the kitchen. I could hear his wet wheels squeak against the linoleum as he followed.

I fit the paper bag into a space on the top shelf of the fridge, and then turned slowly to meet the eyes I could feel boring into me.

"Charlie won't be back for a long time." My voice was rude.

He nodded in agreement but said nothing.

"Thanks again for the fish fry," I hinted.

He continued nodding. I sighed and leaned back against the counter.

"Bella," he said, and then he hesitated.

I waited.

"Bella," he said again, "Charlie is one of my best friends."

"Yes."

He spoke each word carefully in his deep voice. "I noticed you've been spending time with one of the Cullens."

"Yes," I repeated.

His eyes narrowed again. "Maybe it's none of my business, but I don't think that is such a good idea."

"You're right," I agreed. "It is none of your business."

He raised his thick eyebrows at my tone. "You probably don't know this, but the Cullen family has an unpleasant reputation on the reservation."

"Actually, I did know that," I said in a hard voice. He looked surprised. "But that reputation couldn't be deserved, could it? Because the Cullens never set foot on the reservation, do they?" I could see that my less-than-subtle reminder of the agreement that both bound and protected his tribe pulled him up short.

"That's true," he agreed, his eyes guarded. "You seem... well informed about the Cullens. More informed than I expected."

I stared him down. "Maybe even better informed than you are."

He pursed his lips as he considered that. "Maybe," he allowed, but his eyes were shrewd. "Is Charlie as well informed?"

He had found the weak spot in my armor.

"Charlie likes the Cullens a lot," I said. He obviously understood my evasion. His expression was unhappy, but not surprised.

"It's not my business," he said. "But it may be Charlie's."

"Though it would be my business, again, whether or not I think that it's Charlie's business, right?"

I wondered if she even understood my confused question as I struggled not to say anything compromising. But he seemed to. He thought about it while the rain picked up against the roof, the only sound breaking the silence.

"Yes." He finally surrendered. "I guess that's your business, too."

I sighed with relief. "Thanks, Billy."

"Just think about what you're doing, Bella," he urged.

"Okay," I agreed quickly.

He frowned. "What I meant to say was, don't do what you're doing."

I looked into his eyes, filled only with concern for me, and there was nothing I could say.

The front door banged loudly.

"There's no picture anywhere in that car." Jacob's complaining voice reached us before he did. He rounded the corner. The shoulders of his t-shirt were stained with the rain, his long hair dripping.

"Hmm," Billy grunted, suddenly detached, spinning his chair around to face his son. "I guess I left it at home."

Jacob rolled his eyes dramatically. "Great."

"Well, Bella, tell Charlie"—Billy paused before continuing—"that we stopped by, I mean."

"I will," I muttered.

Jacob was surprised. "Are we leaving already?"

"Charlie's gonna be out late," Billy explained as he rolled himself past Jacob.

"Oh." Jacob looked disappointed. "Well, I guess I'll see you later, then, Bella."

"Sure," I agreed.

"Take care," Billy warned me. I didn't answer.

Jacob helped his father out the door. I waved briefly, glancing swiftly toward my now-empty truck, and then shut the door before they were gone.

And then I had nothing to do but wait. After a few seconds staring at the empty kitchen, I sighed and started cleaning. At least it kept my hands busy. Not so much my thoughts. Now that I was away from Jasper's addicting mood fix, I was able to really stress out about the game. Though, Edythe had said I didn't have to play, so I really had nothing to stress about. Nothing but my girlfriend meeting my dad. 

I was just finishing the bathroom when I finally heard my dad's car in the drive. I stacked the cleaning supplies in alphabetical order under the sink while listening to him come in the front door. He started banging around under the stairs, stowing his tackle.

"Bella?" he called.

"Hey, Dad," I yelled back.

When I got downstairs, he was scrubbing his hands in the kitchen sink.

"Where's the fish?" I asked.

"Out in the deep freeze."

"I'll go grab a couple while they're fresh—Billy dropped off some of Harry Clearwater's fish fry this afternoon." I tried to sound enthusiastic.

"He did?" dad's eyes lit up. "That's my favorite!"

Dad cleaned up while I got dinner ready. It wasn't long before we were both at the table, eating in silence. Dad was obviously enjoying the food. I was wondering how on earth I was supposed to broach the subject of my new... girlfriend.

"What did you do with yourself today?" he asked, snapping me out of my thoughts.

"Well, this afternoon I just hung out around the house...." Only the very recent part of this afternoon, actually. I tried to keep my voice upbeat, but my stomach was hollow. "And this morning I was over at the Cullens'."

Dad dropped his fork, a looked at me through wide eyes.

"Dr. Cullen's place?" he asked in astonishment.

I pretended not to notice his reaction. "Yeah."

"What were you doing there?" He hadn't picked his fork back up.

"Well, I sort of have a date with Edythe Cullen tonight, and she wanted to introduce me to her parents."

He stared at me like I'd just announced that I'd spent the day knocking over liquor stores.

"What, Dad? Didn't you just tell me that you wanted me to socialize?"

He blinked a few times, then picked up his fork. "Yeah, I guess I did." He took another bite, chewed slowly, and swallowed. "And didn't you just tell me that none of the girls in town are your type?"

"I didn't say that, you did."

"Don't get touchy with me, kid, you know what I mean. Why didn't you say something? Was I being too nosey?"

"No, Dad, it's just... this is all kind of new, okay? I didn't want to jinx it."

"Huh." He reflected for a minute while he ate another bite, then he smirked at me. "So you went to meet her moms, eh?"

"yeah. I mean, I already knew Dr. Cullen. But I got to meet her other mom."

"Esme Cullen is great—quiet, but very... kind, I guess is the best word for it. There's something about her."

"Yeah, I noticed that."

"Meeting the parents, though. Isn't that kind of serious? Does that mean she's your girlfriend?"

"Yeah." This wasn't as hard as I'd thought it would be. I felt a strange sense of pride, being able to claim her this way. "Yeah, she's my girlfriend."

"Wow, nice."

"You're telling me."

"Do I get a visit, too?"

I raised one eyebrow. "Will you be on your best behavior?"

He lifted both hands. "What, me? Have I ever embarrassed you before?"

"Have I ever brought a girl over before?"

He huffed, then changed the subject. "When are you picking her up?"

"Um, she's meeting me here. See—you do get a visit. She'll probably be here soon, actually."

"Where are you taking her?"

"Well, I guess the plan is that we're going to go... play baseball with her family."

Das stared at me for one second, and then he started laughing. I rolled my eyes and waited for him to finish. Eventually, he pretended to wipe tears out of his eyes.

"I hope you're getting that out of your system now."

"Baseball, huh? You must really like this girl, Bells. Make sure to take a video I'd love to see that."

I thought about just shrugging that off, but I figured he'd see through me anyway. "Yeah," I said. "I really do."

I heard an unfamiliar engine roar up to the house, and I looked up in surprise.

"That her?"

"Maybe..."

After a few seconds, the doorbell rang, and dad jumped up. I ran around him and beat him to the door.

"Pushy much?" he laughed under his breath.

I hadn't realized how hard it was pouring outside. Edythe stood in the halo of the porch light, looking like a model in an ad for raincoats.

I just stared at her, gobsmacked.

She laughed. "Can I come in?"

"Yeah! Of course." I jumped back out of her way, knocking into dad in the process.

After a few seconds of bumbling around, I had her jacket hung up and had both her and my dad sitting down in the living room. She was in the armchair, so I went to sit next to dad on the sofa.

"So, Edythe, how are your parents?"

"Excellent, thank you, Chief Swan."

"You can call me Charlie. I'm off the clock."

"Thanks, Charlie." She unleashed the dimples, and for the first time they failed to dazzle someone.

He was immune to her charm. "So, I hear you're playing baseball tonight?"

It didn't seem to occur to either of them that the buckets of water falling out of the sky right now should impact these plans. Only in Washington.

"Yes. Hopefully Bella doesn't mind hanging out with my family too much."

Dad jumped in before I could respond. "I'd say it was the baseball she'd mind more."

They both laughed. I shot my dad a look. Where was the best behavior I'd been promised? 

"Should we be on our way?" I suggested, trying to get this over with.

"We're not in any hurry," Edythe said with a grin.

I hit dad with my elbow. Edythe's smile got wider.

"Oh, uh, yeah," he said. "You kids go ahead, I've got a... a bunch of stuff to get to...."

Edythe was on her feet in a fluid move. "It was lovely to see you, Charlie."

"Yes. You come visit anytime, Edythe."

"Thank you, you're very kind."

"Will you kids be out super late?"

I looked at her.

"No, we'll be reasonable."

"Don't wait up, though," I added.

I handed her coat to her and then held the door. As she passed, dad shot a smirk and a thumps up. I groaned and followed her out onto the porch, then stopped dead.

There, behind my truck, was a monster Jeep. Its tires were as high as, well, me. There were metal guards over the headlights and taillights, and four large spotlights attached to the crash bar. The hardtop was shiny red.

My dad let out a low whistle. "Wear your seat belts."

Edythe was inside in one efficient little leap, though I was glad we were on the far side of the Jeep from dad, because it didn't look entirely natural. I went to my side and climbed gracelessly into my seat. She had the engine running now, and I recognized the roar that had surprised me earlier. It wasn't as loud as my truck, but it sounded a lot more brawny.

Out of habit—she wasn't going to start driving until I was buckled in—I reached for my seat belt.

"What—what is all this? How do I...?"

"Off-roading harness," she explained.

"Um."

I tried to find all the right connectors, but it wasn't going too fast. And then her hands were there, flashing around at a barely visible speed, and gone again. I was glad the rain was too thick to see dad clearly on the porch, because that meant he couldn't see me clearly, either.

"thanks." I laughed.

"You're welcome."

I knew better than to ask if she was going to put her own harness on.

She pulled away from the house.

"This is a... large Jeep you have."

"It's Emmett's. He let me borrow it so we wouldn't have to run the whole way."

"Wait. Run the whole way? As in, we're still going to run part of the way?" I demanded suddenly feeling sick.

She pursed her lips like she was trying not to smile. "You're not going to run. I'm going to run, you'll be on my back again."

I groaned, "I'm going to puke in front of your whole family."

"Keep your eyes closed, you'll be fine." Her hand was in mine instantly, making me feel better.

I sighed, squeezing her hand. "Hi. I missed you."

She laughed—it was a trilling sound that made me feel alive. "I missed you, too. Isn't that strange?"

"Why strange?"

"You'd think I'd have learned more patience over the last hundred years. And here I am, finding it difficult to pass an afternoon without you."

"I'm glad it's not just me, I was impatient too."

She leaned over to swiftly kiss my cheek, then pulled back quickly and sighed. "You smell even better in the rain."

"In a good way or a bad way?"

She frowned. "Always both."

I don't know how she even knew where we were going with the downpour—it was like a liquid gray curtain around the Jeep—but she somehow found a side road that was more or less a mountain path. For a long while conversation was impossible, because I was bouncing up and down on the seat like a jackhammer. She seemed to enjoy the ride, though, smiling hugely the whole way.

And then we came to the end of the road; the trees formed green walls on three sides of the Jeep. The rain was a mere drizzle, slowing every second, the sky brighter through the clouds.

"Sorry, Bella, we have to go on foot from here."

"You know what? I think I'll just wait here, let me know how the game goes."

She laughed, "What happened to all your courage? You were extraordinary this morning."

"I haven't forgotten the last time yet." Was it really only yesterday?

She was around to my side of the car in a blur, and she started on the harness.

"I'll get those, you go on ahead, I'll meet you there." She was finished before I got the first few words out.

I sat in the car, looking at her.

"Do you trust me?" she asked, head turned sideways in that cute kitten like way.

"That really isn't the issue. Trust and motion sickness have zero relationship to each other."

She looked at me for a minute.

"Do you remember what I was saying about mind over matter?" she asked.

"Yes..."

"Maybe if you concentrated on something else."

"Like what?"

Suddenly she was in the Jeep with me, straddling me, her hands on my face. Her face was only inches away. I had a light heart attack.

"Keep breathing," she told me.

"How?"

She smiled, and then her face was serious again. "When we're running—and yes, that part is nonnegotiable—I want you to concentrate on this."

Slowly, she moved in closer, turning her face to the side so that we were cheek to cheek, her lips at my ear. One of her hands slid down my chest to my waist.

"Just remember us... like this...."

Her lips pulled softly on my earlobe, then moved slowly across my jaw and down my neck.

"Breathe, Bella," she murmured.

I sucked in a shaky lungful of air.

She kissed under the edge of my jaw, and then along my cheekbone. "Still worried?"

"Huh?"

She chuckled. Her hands were holding my face now, and she lightly kissed one eyelid and then the next.

"Edythe," I breathed.

Then her lips were on mine, and they weren't quite as gentle and cautious as they always had been before. They moved urgently, cold and unyielding, and though I knew better, I couldn't think coherently enough to make good decisions. I didn't consciously tell my hands to move, but my arms were wrapped around her waist, trying to pull her closer. My mouth moved with hers and I was gasping for air, gasping in her scent with every breath.

"Dammit, Bella!"

And then she was gone—slithering easily out of my grasp—already standing ten feet away outside the car by the time I'd blinked my way back to reality.

"Oops," I gasped.

She stared warily at me with her eyes so wide the white showed all the way around the gold. I half-fell awkwardly from the car, then took a step toward her.

"I truly do think you'll be the death of me, Bella," she said quietly, chuckling under her breath.

I nodded, "Same,"

She took a deep breath, and then she was right next to me. "Let's get out of here before I do something really stupid," she muttered.

She turned her back to me, staring back over her shoulder with a get on with it look.

And how was I supposed to reject her now? Slowly, I climbed onto her back.

"Keep your eyes shut," she warned, and then she was off.

I forced my eyes closed, trying not to think about the speed of the wind that was pushing the skin flat against my skull. Other than that tell, it was hard to believe we were really flying through the forest like we had before. The motion of her body was so smooth, I would have thought she was just strolling down the sidewalk. Her breath came and went evenly.

I wasn't entirely sure we had stopped when she reached back and touched my face.

"It's over, Bella, you can open your eyes."

I opened my eyes, and sure enough, we were at a standstill. In my hurry to get off her, I lost my balance. She turned just in time to watch as I—arms windmilling wildly—fell hard on my ass.

For a second she stared like she wasn't sure if she was still too mad to find me funny, but then she must have decided that she was not too mad.

She burst into long peals of laughter, throwing her head back and holding her arms across her stomach.

I got up slowly and brushed the mud and weeds off the back of my jeans the best I could while she kept laughing. I tried my best to keep the amusement off my face.

"You know, it would probably be more humane for you to just dump me now," I joked, letting out a few laughs of my own. "It's not going to get any easier for me over time."

She took a few deep breaths, trying to get control of herself.

I sighed and started walking in the most path-like direction I could see.

Something caught the back of my sweater, and I smiled. I looked over my shoulder. She had a fistful of sweater.

"Where are you going, Bella?"

"Wasn't there a baseball game happening?"

"It's the other way."

I pivoted. "Okay."

She took my hand and we started walking slowly toward a dark patch of forest.

"I'm sorry I laughed."

"I would have laughed at me, too." I said honestly.

"No, I was just a little... agitated. I needed the catharsis."

We walked silently for a few seconds.

"At least tell me it worked—the mind-over-matter experiment."

"Well... I didn't get sick."

"Good, but...?"

"I wasn't thinking about... in the car. I was thinking about after."

She didn't say anything.

"I will learn how to do better, I know—"

"Bella, stop. Please, you make me feel even more guilty when you apologize."

I looked down at her. We'd both stopped walking. "Why should you feel guilty?"

She laughed again, but this time there was an almost hysterical edge to her laugh. "Oh, indeed! Why should I feel guilty?"

The darkness in her eyes made me anxious. There was pain there, and I didn't know how to make it better. I put my hand against her cheek. "Edythe, I don't understand what you're saying."

She closed her eyes. "I just can't seem to stop putting you in danger. I think I'm in control of myself, and then it gets so close—I don't know how to not be this anymore." Eyes still closed, she gestured to herself. "My very existence puts you at risk. Sometimes I truly hate myself. I should be stronger, I should be able to—"

I moved my hand to cover her mouth. "Stop."

Her eyes opened. She peeled my hand off her mouth and placed it over her cheek again.

"I love you," she said. "It's a poor excuse for what I'm doing, but it's still true."

It was the first time she'd ever said she loved me—in so many words. Like she'd said this morning, it was different, hearing the words out loud.

"I love you," I told her when I'd caught my breath. "I don't want you to be anything other than what you are."

She sighed. "Now, be a good girl," she said, and rubbed her nose against mine.

I held very still while she brushed her lips softly against mine.

We stared at each other for a minute.

"Baseball?" she asked.

"Baseball," I agreed much more confidently than I felt.

She took my hand and led me a few feet through the tall ferns and around a massive hemlock tree, and we were suddenly there, on the edge of an enormous clearing on the side of a mountain. It was twice the size of any baseball stadium.

All of the others were there. Esme, Emmett, and Rosalie were sitting on an outcropping of rock, maybe a hundred yards away. Much farther out I could see Jasper and Archie standing at least a quarter of a mile apart. It was almost like they were pantomiming playing catch; I never saw any ball. It looked like Carine was marking bases, but that couldn't be right. The points were much too far apart.

When we walked into view, the three on the rocks stood. Esme started toward us. Rosalie walked away, toward where Carine was setting up. Emmett followed Esme after a long look at Rosalie's back.

I was staring at Rosalie's back, too. Annoyance filling up in me as I watched her walk away.

"Was that you we heard before, Edythe?" Esme asked.

"Sounded like a hyena choking to death," Emmett added.

I smiled tentatively at Esme. "That was her."

"Bella was being funny," Edythe explained.

Archie had left off his game of catch and was running toward us—it was like his feet never touched the ground. In half a heartbeat he was there, hurtling to a stop right in front of us.

"It's time," he announced.

The second he spoke, a deep rumble of thunder shook the forest behind us and then crashed westward toward town.

"Eerie, isn't it?" Emmett said to me. When I turned to look at him, he winked.

"Let's go!" Archie took Emmett's hand and they darted toward the oversized diamond. Archie almost... bounded—like a stag, but closer to the ground. Emmett was just as fast and nearly as graceful, but he was something altogether different. Something that charged, not bounded.

"Are you ready for some ball?" Edythe asked, her eyes bright.

It was impossible not to be enthusiastic about something that clearly made her happy. "Go team!" I clapped my hands once and raise them in fists straight above my head.

She laughed, quickly caressing my face, then raced off after the other two. Her run was more aggressive than either of the others', like a cheetah to a gazelle—but still supple and heartbreakingly beautiful. She quickly caught up to and then passed the others.

"Shall we go watch?" Esme asked in her soft tenor voice. I realized that I was staring openmouthed after them. I quickly reassembled my expression and nodded. Esme kept a few feet farther away than was exactly normal for two people walking together, and I figured she was still being careful not to frighten me. She matched her stride to mine without seeming impatient at the pace.

"You don't play with them?" I asked.

"No, I prefer to referee. I like keeping them honest."

"Do they cheat?"

"Oh yes—and you should hear the arguments they get into! Actually, I hope you don't, you would think they were raised by a pack of wolves."

"You sound like my mom," I laughed.

She laughed, too. "Well, I do think of them as my children in most ways. I never could get over—" She broke off, and then took a deep breath. "Did Edythe tell you I lost my daughter?"

"no," I murmured, stunned, scrambling to understand what lifetime she was remembering.

"My only child—my Grace. She died when she was barely two. It broke my heart—that's why I jumped off the cliff, you know," she added calmly.

"Oh, um, Edythe just said you fell...."

"Always so polite." Esme smiled. "Edythe was the first of my new children. My second daughter. I've always thought of her that way—though she's older than I, in one way at least—and wondered if my Grace would have grown into such an amazing person." He looked at me and smiled warmly. "I'm so happy she's found you, Bella. She's been the odd man out for far too long. It's hurt me to see her alone."

You don't mind, then?" I asked, hesitant again. "That I'm... all wrong for her?"

"No," she said thoughtfully. "You're what she wants. It will all work out, somehow." But her forehead creased with worry.

Another peal of thunder began.

Esme stopped then; apparently, we'd reached the edge of the field. It looked as if they had formed teams. Edythe was far out in left field, Carine stood between the first and second bases, and Archie held the ball, positioned on the spot that must be the pitcher's mound.

Emmett was swinging an aluminum bat; it whistled almost untraceably through the air. I waited for him to approach home plate, but then I realized, as he leaned into his stance, that he was already there—farther from the pitcher's mound than I would have thought possible. Jasper stood several feet behind him, catching for the other team. Of course, none of them had gloves.

"All right," Esme called in a clear voice, which I guessed even Edythe would hear, as far out as she was. "Batter up."

Archie stood straight, still as a statue. His style seemed to be stealth rather than an intimidating windup. He held the ball in both hands at his waist, and then, like the strike of a cobra, his right hand flicked out and the ball smacked into Jasper's hand with a sound like a gunshot.

"Was that a strike?" I whispered to Esme.

"If they don't hit it, it's a strike," she told me.

Jasper hurled the ball back to Archie's waiting hand. He permitted himself a brief grin. And then his hand spun out again.

This time the bat somehow made it around in time to smash into the invisible ball. I jumped up, startled as I covered my ears to protect them from the crack of impact which was shattering, thunderous; it echoed off the mountainside—I immediately understood the need for the storm.

I was barely able to follow the ball, shooting like a meteor above the field, flying deep into the surrounding forest.

"Home run," I muttered.

"Wait," Esme said. She was listening intently, one hand raised. Emmett was a blur around the bases, Carine shadowing him. I realized Edythe was missing.

"Out!" Esme cried. I stared in disbelief as Edythe sprang from the fringe of the trees, ball in her upraised hand, her wide grin visible even to me.

"Emmett hits the hardest," Esme explained, "but Edythe runs the fastest."

It was like watching superheroes play. It was impossible to keep up with the speed at which the ball flew, the rate at which their bodies raced around the field.

I learned the other reason they waited for a thunderstorm to play when Jasper, trying to avoid Edythe's infallible fielding, hit a ground ball toward Carine. Carine ran into the ball, and then raced Jasper to first base. When they collided, the sound was like the crash of two massive falling boulders. I jumped up, afraid someone would be hurt, but they were both totally fine.

"Safe," Esme called in a calm voice.

Emmett's team was up by one—Rosalie managed to tear around the bases after tagging up on one of Emmett's long flies—when Edythe caught the third out. She sprinted to my side, beaming with excitement.

"What do you think?" she asked, after pressing a soft kiss on my lips.

"One thing's for sure, I'll never be able to sit through dull old Major League Baseball again."

"And it sounds like you did so much of that before," she laughed.

"I am a little disappointed," I teased.

"Why?"

"Well, it would be nice if I could find just one thing you didn't do better than everyone else on the planet."

She flashed her dimples, leaving me breathless.

"I'm up," she said, heading for the plate.

She played intelligently, keeping the ball low, out of the reach of Rosalie's always-ready hand in the outfield, gaining two bases like lightning before Emmett could get the ball back in play. Carine knocked one so far out of the field—with a boom that hurt my ears—that she and Edythe both made it in. Archie slapped them high fives.

The score constantly changed as the game continued, and they razzed each other like street ballplayers as they took turns with the lead. Occasionally Esme would call them to order. The thunder rumbled on, but we stayed dry, as Archie had predicted.

Carine was up to bat, Edythe catching, when Archie suddenly gasped. My eyes were on Edythe, as usual, and I saw her head snap up to look at him. Their eyes met and something flowed between them in half a second. She was at my side before the others could ask Archie what was wrong.

"Archie?" Esme asked, tense.

"I didn't see," Archie whispered. "I couldn't tell."

They were all gathered in now.

Carine was calm, authoritative. "What is it, Archie?"

"They were traveling much quicker than I thought. I can see I had the perspective wrong before," he murmured.

Jasper put his arm around him, his posture protective. "What changed?" he asked.

"They heard us playing, and it changed their path," Archie said, contrite, as if he felt responsible for whatever had happened.

Seven pairs of quick eyes flashed to my face and away.

"How soon?" Carine asked.

A look of intense concentration crossed her face.

"Less than five minutes. They're running—they want to play." He scowled.

"Can you make it?" Carine asked Edythe, her eyes flicking toward me again.

"No, not carrying—" She cut short. "Besides, the last thing we need is for them to catch the scent and start hunting."

"How many?" Emmett asked Archie.

"Three."

"Three!" he scoffed. "Let them come." The long bands of muscle flexed down his arms.

For a split second that seemed much longer than it really was, Carine deliberated. Only Emmett seemed relaxed; the rest stared at Carine's face, obviously anxious.

"Let's just continue the game," Carine finally decided. Her voice was cool and level. "Archie said they were simply curious."

The entire conference lasted only a few seconds, but I had listened carefully and thought I'd caught most of it. I couldn't hear what Esme asked Edythe now with just an intense look. I only saw the slight shake of her head and the look of relief on her face.

"You catch, mom," she said. "I'll call it now."

She stood right next to me as the others returned to the field, all of their eyes sweeping the forest. Archie and Esme seemed to orient themselves around where I stood.

I stated the obvious. "The others are coming now."

"Yes, stay very still, keep quiet, and don't move from my side, please." I could hear the stress in her voice, though she tried to hide it.

"That won't help," Archie murmured. "I could smell her from across the field."

"I know," Edythe snapped.

Carine stood at the plate, and the others joined the game halfheartedly.

"What did Esme ask you?" I whispered.

She hesitated a second before she answered. "Whether they were thirsty."

The seconds dragged by while the game progressed apathetically. No one dared to hit harder than a bunt, and Emmett, Rosalie, and Jasper hovered in the infield. Now and again, I was aware of Rosalie's eyes on me. They were expressionless, but something about the way she held her mouth made me sure she was angry.

Edythe paid no attention to the game at all, eyes and mind scanning the forest.

"I'm sorry, Bella," she muttered fiercely. "It was stupid, irresponsible, to expose you like this. I'm so sorry."

I heard her breath stop, and her eyes zeroed in on right field. She took a half-step, angling herself between me and what was coming. It made me start to panic, like I had before, imagining her between me and Rosalie—Edythe in danger. I was pretty sure whatever was coming now was worse than Rosalie. And yet I still felt the urge to protect Edythe from that danger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no valid excuse for keeping you waiting.  
Sorry.  
....it will probably happen again.


	18. The Hunt

My breath stilled as I watched them emerge from the forest one by one. They were three of them, two women and one man. The first woman, who’s red hair was like a wildfire in the wind, stepped through the clearing and instantly fell back, aligning herself behind the tall dark haired black woman in a manner than made it clear who was in charge. The third was a man, wo followed slightly behind the beautiful creatures.

They closed ranks before they continued cautiously toward Edythe's family. It was like a wildlife show—a troop of predators exhibiting natural respect as it encounters a larger, unfamiliar group of its own kind.

As they approached, I could see how different they were from the Cullens. Their walk was catlike, a gait that seemed constantly on the edge of shifting into a crouch. They were dressed in ordinary backpacking gear: jeans and casual button-down shirts in heavy, weatherproof fabrics. The clothes were frayed with wear, though, and they were barefoot. Their hair was filled with leaves and debris from the woods.

The woman in the lead analyzed Carine as she stepped forward, flanked by Emmett and Jasper, to meet them, and she straightened out of her half-crouch. The other two copied her.

The woman in front was easily the most beautiful. Her skin was brown but had a slightly cold tone to it, and her hair was a black head of dreads. She wasn't tall, but she looked strong—though not strong like Emmett. She smiled easily, exposing a flash of gleaming white teeth.

The other woman was wilder. Her eyes darted restlessly between the Cullens, and her posture was oddly feline. The man stayed unobtrusive in the back, smaller than the leader, with bland brown hair and a forgettable face. His eyes were the calmest, the most still. But I had a strange feeling that he was seeing more than the others.

It was their eyes that made them the most different. They weren't gold or black like I was used to, but a deep, vivid red.

The black woman, still smiling, stepped toward Carine.

"We thought we heard a game," she said. There was the hint of a French accent in her voice. "I'm Laure, these are Victoria and James."

"I'm Carine. This is my family, Emmett and Jasper, Rosalie, Esme and Archie, Edythe and Bella." She pointed us out in groups, deliberately not calling attention to individuals. I felt a shock when she said my name.

"Do you have room for a few more players?" Laure asked.

Carine matched Laure's friendly tone. "Actually, we were just finishing up. But we'd certainly be interested another time. Are you planning to stay in the area for long?"

"We're headed north, in fact, but we were curious to see who was in the neighborhood. We haven't run into any company in a long time."

"No, this region is usually empty except for us and the occasional visitor, like yourselves."

The tense atmosphere had slowly subsided into a casual conversation; I figured Jasper was using his strange gift to control the situation.

"What's your hunting range?" Laure casually inquired.

Carine ignored the assumption. "The Olympic Range here, up and down the Coast Ranges on occasion. We keep a permanent residence nearby. There's another permanent settlement like ours up near Denali."

Laure rocked back on her heels slightly.

“Permanent? How do you manage that?" There was honest curiosity in her voice.

"Why don't you come back to our home with us and we can talk comfortably?" Carine invited. "It's a rather long story."

Victoria and James exchanged a surprised look at the mention of the word home, but Laure controlled her expression better.

"That sounds very interesting, and welcome." She smiled. "We've been on the hunt all the way down from Ontario, and we haven't had the chance to clean up in a while." Her eyes moved appreciatively over Carine's clothes.

"Please don't take offense, but we'd appreciate it if you'd refrain from hunting in this immediate area. We have to stay inconspicuous, you understand," Carine explained.

"Of course." Laure nodded. "We certainly won't encroach on your territory. We just ate outside of Seattle, anyway." She laughed. A shiver ran up my spine.

"We'll show you the way if you'd like to run with us—Emmett and Archie, you can go with Edythe and Bella to get the Jeep," Carine casually added.

Three things seemed to happen at the same time when Carine finished. A light breeze ruffled my hair, Edythe stiffened, and the man, James, suddenly whipped his head around, scrutinizing me, his nostrils flaring.

Everyone went rigid as James lurched one step forward into a crouch. Edythe bared her teeth, coiling in front of me, a feral snarl ripping from her throat. It was nothing at all like the playful growls I'd heard her make before; it was the most menacing sound I'd ever heard. Chills ran from the crown of my head to the back of my heels.

"What's this?" Laure asked, shocked. Neither Edythe nor James relaxed their aggressive stance. James feinted slightly to the side, but Edythe had already shifted to answer his move.

"She's with us," Carine said directly to James, her voice cold.

Laure seemed to catch my scent then, though less powerfully than James, and understanding lit her face. "You brought a snack?" She took a step forward.

Edythe snarled even more harshly, her lip curled back high above her bared teeth. Laure stepped back again.

"I said she's with us," Carine snapped.

"But she's human," Laure protested. She didn't say it with any aggression, she just sounded surprised.

Emmett leaned forward, suddenly very there at Carine's side. "Yes." Her eyes were locked on James.

Janes slowly straightened out of his crouch, but his eyes never left me, his nostrils still wide. Edythe stayed tensed in front of me. I wanted to pull her back—this James vampire wasn't messing around—but I could guess exactly how well that would go over. She'd told me to stay still, so I would... unless someone tried to hurt her.

When Laure spoke, her tone was soothing—trying to defuse the sudden hostility. "It appears we have a lot to learn about each other."

"Indeed." Carine's voice was still cool.

"But we'd like to accept your invitation." Her eyes flicked toward me and back to Carine. "And, of course, we will not harm the human girl. We won't hunt in your range, as I said."

James glanced at Laure in disbelief and exchanged a brief look with Victoria, whose eyes still flickered edgily from face to face.

Carine measured Laure's sincere expression for a second before she spoke. "We'll show you the way. Jazz, Rosalie, Esme?" she called. They gathered together, blocking me from view as they converged. Archie was instantly at my side, while Emmett moved more slowly, his eyes locked on James as he backed toward us.

"Let's move, Bella," Edythe said, low and bleak. She gripped my elbow and pulled me forward. Archie and Emmett stayed close behind us, hiding me from whoever might still be watching. I stumbled alongside Edythe, trying to keep up with the pace she set. I couldn't hear if the main group had left yet. Edythe's impatience was almost tangible as we moved at human speed to the edge of the forest.

"I'm faster," she snapped, answering someone's thought.

Then we were in the trees and Edythe pulled my arm around her neck while we were still half-jogging forward. I realized what she wanted climbed into place. We were running before I was set.

I couldn't make my eyes close, but the forest was pretty much black now anyway. I couldn't see or hear Emmett and Archie running alongside us. Like Edythe, they moved through the forest as if they were ghosts.

We were at the Jeep in seconds. Edythe barely slowed, she just spun and whipped me into the backseat.

"Strap her in," she hissed at Emmett, who climbed in next to me.

Archie was already in the front seat, and Edythe revved the engine. She swerved backward, spinning around to face the winding road.

Edythe was growling something so fast I couldn't tell what she was saying, but it kind of sounded like a string of profanities. The jolting ride was much worse this time, in the dark. Emmett and Archie glared out the side windows.

We hit the main road. The Jeep raced faster. It was dark, but I recognized the direction we were headed. South, away from Forks.

"Where are we going?" I asked.

No one answered. No one even looked at me.

"Is anyone going to tell me what's happening?"

Edythe kept her eyes on the road as she spoke. The speedometer read one-oh-five. "We have to get you away from here—far away—now."

"What? But I have to go home."  
"You can't go home, Bella." The way she said it sounded kind of permanent.

"I don't understand. Edythe? What do you mean?"

Archie spoke for the first time. "Pull over, Edythe."

She flashed him a hard look and gunned the engine.

"Edythe," Archie said. "Look at all the different ways this can go. We need to think this through." There was a warning in his voice, and I wondered what he was seeing in his head, what he was showing Edythe.

"You don't understand," Edythe nearly howled in frustration. The speedometer was at one hundred and fifteen. "He's a tracker, Archie! Did you see that? He's a tracker!"

I felt Emmett stiffen next to me, and I wondered what the word meant to him. Obviously it meant a lot more to the three of them than it did to me. I wanted to understand, but there was no opening for me to ask.

"Pull over, Edythe." Archie's voice was harder now, steely.

The speedometer inched past one-twenty.

"Do it," he barked.

"Archie—listen! I saw his mind. Tracking is his passion, his obsession—and he wants her, Archie—her, specifically. He's already begun."

"He doesn't know where—"

"How long do you think it will take him to cross Bella's scent in town? His plan was already set before the words were out of Laure's mouth."

It was like a punch to the gut. I couldn't breathe for a second as what she was saying finally made concrete sense. Up till now, it had all felt like something abstract, like a word problem in Math. It didn't seem to connect to me in any real way.

I knew where my scent would lead.

"Charlie," I gasped. And then I yelled. "Charlie! We have to go back. We have to get Charlie!"

I started ripping at the buckles that held me in place, until Emmett grabbed my wrists. Trying to yank them back was like trying to pull out of handcuffs that were bolted into concrete.

"Edythe! Turn around!" I shouted.

"She's right," Archie said.

The car slowed a tiny bit.

"Let's just look at our options for a minute," Archie coaxed.

The car slowed again, more noticeably, and then suddenly we screeched to a stop on the shoulder of the highway. I flew against the harness and then slammed back into the seat.

"There are no options," Edythe snarled.

"We're not leaving Charlie!" I yelled.

She looked at me for the first time and I saw fear in her eyes.

Emmett finally spoke. "We have to take her back."

"No."

"He's no match for us, Edy. He won't be able to touch her."

"He'll wait."

Emmett smiled a cold, strangely eager smile. "I can wait, too."

Edythe huffed out a breath, exasperated. "You didn't see! You don't understand! Once he commits to a hunt, he's unshakable. We can't reason with him. We can't scare him off. We'd have to kill him."

This didn't bother Emmett. "Yes."

"And the other woman. She's with him. If it turns into a fight, Laure will side with them, too."

"There are enough of us."

"There's another option," Archie said quietly.

Edythe turned on him, furious, her voice a blistering snarl. "There—is—no—other—option!"

Emmett and I both stared at her in shock, but Archie didn't seem surprised. The silence lasted for a long minute as Edythe and Archie stared each other down.

"Does anyone want to hear my idea?" I asked.

“Sure,” Edythe replied, though I knew with my safety on the line

I began, "You take me back."

"No!"

"Yes! You take me back. I tell my dad I want to go home to Phoenix. I pack my bags. We wait till this tracker is watching, and then we run. He'll follow us and leave dad alone. Then you can take me any damned place you want."

They stared at me with wide eyes.

"It's not a bad idea, really." Emmett sounded so surprised, it was an insult.

"It might work—and we can't just leave his father unprotected," Archie said. "You know that, Edythe."

Everyone looked at Edythe.

"It's too dangerous—I don't want him within a hundred miles of Bella."

"he's not getting through us." Emmett was very confident.

Archie closed his eyes for a second. "I don't see him attacking. He's the kind that goes around, not through. He'll wait for us to leave her unprotected."

"It won't take long for him to realize that's not going to happen," Edythe said.

"I have to go home, Edythe."

She pressed her fingers to her temples and squeezed her eyes shut for a second. Then she was looking softly at me.

"Your plan takes too long. We've got no time for the packing charade, Bella. I can’t have you unsafe for one second."

"If I don't give him some kind of excuse, he'll make trouble for your family. He’ll call the FBI or something if he thinks you've... I don't know, kidnapped me."

"That doesn't matter."

"Yes. It does. There's a way to keep everyone safe, and that's what we're going to do." I said stubbornly. “You cannot take me anywhere against my will,”

The Jeep rumbled to life, and she spun us around, the tires squealing. The needle on the speedometer started to race up the dial.

“I know, I’m acting irrational, but I’m just scared. I can’t lose you, Bella….You're leaving tonight," Edythe said, and her voice sounded worn. "Whether the tracker sees or not. Tell Charlie whatever you want—as long as it's quick. Pack the first things your hands touch, then get in your truck. I don't care what Charlie says. You have fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes from the time you cross the doorstep or I carry you out."

A few minutes passed in silence, other than the roar of the engine.

"Emmett?" I asked, looking at my hands.

"Oh, sorry." He let me loose.

“Never do that again, you bitch,”

"This is how it's going to happen," Edythe spoke past Emmett’s laughter. "When we get to the house, if the tracker is not there, I will walk Bella to the door. Then she has fifteen minutes." She looked at me in the rearview mirrors. "Emmett, you take the outside of the house. Archie, you get the truck. I'll be inside as long as she is. After she's out, you two can take the Jeep home and tell Carine."

"No way," Emmett broke in. "I'm with you."

"Think it through, Em. I don't know how long I'll be gone."

"Until we know how far this is going to go, I'm with you."

Edythe sighed. "If the tracker is there," she continued grimly, "we keep driving."

"We're going to make it there before him," Archie said confidently.

Edythe seemed to accept that. Whatever her problem with Archie was, she didn't doubt him now.

"What are we going to do with the Jeep?" he asked.

Edythe's voice had a hard edge. "You're driving it home."

"No, I'm not," he said calmly.

The unintelligible stream of profanities started again.

"I think you should let me go alone," I said even more quietly.

"Bella, please don’t do this to me," she said between clenched teeth.

"Listen, dad's not an imbecile," I argued. "If you're not in town tomorrow, he's going to get suspicious."

"That's irrelevant. We'll make sure he's safe, and that's all that matters."

"Then what about this tracker? He saw how you acted tonight. He's going to think you're with me, wherever you are."

Emmett looked at me, insultingly surprised again. "Edythe, listen to her," he urged. "I think she's right."

"She is," Archie agreed.

"I can't do that." Edythe's voice was…pained, scared.

"Emmett should stay, too," I continued. "He definitely got an eyeful of Emmett."

"What?" Emmett turned on me, looking betrayed. “I thought we were closer than this, bro,”

"You'll get a better crack at him if you stay," Archie agreed.

Edythe stared at him incredulously. "You think I should let her go alone?"

"Of course not," Archie said. "Jazz and I will take her."

"I can't do that," Edythe repeated, but this time she sounded defeated. The logic was working on her.

I spoke up, "Hang out here for a week"—I saw her expression in the mirror and amended—"a few days. Let dad see you, and lead this hunter on a wild-goose chase. Make sure he's completely off the trail. Then come and meet me. Take a roundabout route, of course, and then Jasper and Archie can go home."

She was beginning to consider it.

"Meet you where?"

"Phoenix."

"No," she said impatiently. "He'll hear that's where you're going."

"And you'll make it look like that's a trick, obviously. He'll know that you'll know that he's listening. He'll never believe I'm actually going where I say I am going."

“She's diabolical," Emmett laughed.

"And if that doesn't work?"

"There are several million people in Phoenix," I informed her.

"It's not that hard to find a phone book."

"It's called a hotel, Edythe."

"Edythe, we'll be with her," Archie reminded her.

"What are you going to do in Phoenix?" she asked Archie scathingly.

"Stay indoors."

"I kind of like it." Emmett was thinking about cornering James, no doubt.

"Shut up, Em."

"Look, if we try to take him down while Bella's still around, there's a much better chance that someone will get hurt—she'll get hurt, or you will, trying to protect her. Now, if we get him alone..." He trailed off with a slow smile. I was right.

The Jeep was crawling slowly along now as we drove into town. I could feel the hairs on my arms standing up. I thought about dad, alone in the house, and my knee was bouncing with impatience.

"Bella," Edythe said in a very soft voice. Archie and Emmett looked out their windows. "If you let anything happen to yourself—anything at all—I'm holding you personally responsible. Do you understand that?"

I stared at her eyes in the mirror. "Same goes for you, Edythe."

She turned to Archie.

"Can Jasper handle this?"

"Give him some credit, Edythe. He's been doing very, very well, all things considered."

"Can you handle this?"

Archie pulled his lips back in a horrific grimace and let loose a guttural snarl that had me wincing into the seat.

Edythe smiled at him. "But keep your opinions to yourself," she muttered suddenly.


	19. Goodbyes

When we reached my street, it looked as if dad was waiting for me. All the light were on and my mind went black as I tried to think of a way to pull this off.

Edythe stopped a car length back from my truck. All three of them were ramrod straight in their seats, listening to every sound of the forest, looking through every shadow around the house, searching for something out of place. The engine died and I sat quietly as they continued to listen.

"She's not here," Edythe hissed. "Let's go."

Emmett reached over to undo the harness. "Don't worry, Bella," he said in a low but cheerful voice. "We'll take care of things here quickly."

I felt the strangest sense of sadness as I looked at Emmett's handsome and terrifying face. I barely knew him, but somehow, not knowing when I would see him again was awful. I knew this was the easiest goodbye I would have to survive in the next hour, and the thought made my stomach churn.

"Archie, Em." Edythe's voice was a command. They slipped soundlessly into the darkness and were gone.

I crawled out after Emmett, and Edythe was already there.

"Fifteen minutes," she said through her teeth.

I nodded, then stopped.

"Hurry, Bella."

"One thing." I grabbed her face between my hands and kissed her once hard. "I love you. Whatever happens now, that doesn't change."

"Nothing is going to happen to you, Bella."

"Keep my dad safe for me."

"Done. Hurry."

I nodded again, and then, with one backward glance at her, I jumped onto the porch and threw the front door open with a loud bang. I lurched inside and kicked the door shut behind me.

I suddenly knew what I was going to do, and I was already horrified at myself.

Dad's face appeared in the hallway. "Bella?"

"Leave me alone," I snapped.

My eyes were starting to feel red and wet, and I knew I was going to have to get it together if I was going to do this right—protect my dad , protect the Cullens, and make this plan work. It would be easier if I wasn't looking at him.

I wheeled and ran up the stairs, then slammed my bedroom door closed and locked it. I threw myself on the floor and yanked a duffel bag out from under the bed. Then I shoved my hand between the mattress and box spring, searching till I found the knotted tube sock with my cash hoard.

Dad pounded on my door. "Bella, are you okay? What's going on, kid? When where in the world did you get the nerve to snap at me like that?"

"I'm going home!" I yelled.

I turned to the dresser, and Edythe was already there, silently yanking out armfuls of clothes that she then threw at me. I caught what I could and stuffed it into the bag.

"So I guess your date didn't go so well." Dad's voice was confused but calmer.

"Ugh, stay out of it, Dad," I growled.

"Did she break up with you?"

"I broke up with her."

Edythe didn't react to what I was saying. She was totally focused. She swept my stuff off the top of the dresser and into the bag with one arm.

"Why?" He asked, surprised. "I thought you really liked this girl, Bells,"

"I do—too much."

"Um... that's not how that works, mija."

Edythe zipped the bag up—apparently my packing time was over. She hung the strap on my shoulder.

"I'll be in the truck—go!" she whispered, and she pushed me toward the door. She vanished out the window.

I unlocked the door and shoved past dad. My bag knocked a picture off the wall as I hurtled down the stairs.

Dad ran after me and grabbed the strap of my bag, hauling me back a step.

"Are you doing drugs, Bella?" he demanded.

"No!"

"Slow down. I don't understand. Tell me what happened."

He had a tight grip on the strap. I could leave it, but that would put a hole in my story. I was going to have to do this the hard way.

I turned to look at him, hoping the red in my eyes looked like anger.

"I'll tell you what happened," I said in the hardest voice I could manage. "I had a great night with the prettiest girl I've ever seen—and we talked about the future. The way she sees it—it's just like you. She's going to stay here the rest of her life. She's going to get married and have kids and never leave. And for a second, that all actually made sense to me. I'm losing myself here—I'm getting sucked in. If I don't run now, I'll never get out!"

"Bella, you can't leave now," he whispered. "It's nighttime."

"I'll sleep in the truck if I get tired."

"Just wait another week," he pleaded, looking shell-shocked. "Renée will be back by then."

This completely derailed me. "What?"

Relief flashed across dads face when I hesitated. "She called while you were out. Things aren't going so well in Florida, and if Phil doesn't get signed by the end of the week, they're going back to Arizona. The assistant coach of the Sidewinders said they might have a spot for another shortstop."

I shook my head, trying to get back on track. Every passing second put my dad in more danger.

"I have a key," I muttered, turning the knob. He was too close, one hand still locked on my bag, his face dazed. I couldn't lose any more time arguing with him. I was going to have to hurt him further.

"Just let me go, Dad," I said through my teeth. I threw the door open. "It didn't work out, okay? I really, really hate Forks!"

The cruel words did their job—His hand dropped from my bag. His mouth fell open with surprise while a deep pain surfaced in his eyes. I turned my back on him and stalked out the door. I couldn't let him see my face now.

I tried to keep my walk angry, but I wanted to sprint. The dark yard seemed full of extra shadows that I was pretty sure were just my imagination. But not totally positive. I hurled my bag into the bed of the truck and wrenched the door open. The key was waiting in the ignition.

"I'll call you tomorrow! Love you!" I yelled.

I would never be able to explain this to him, never be able to make it right again. I gunned the engine and peeled out.

Edythe reached for my hand.

"Pull over," she said as dad and the house disappeared behind us.

I kept my eyes on the road, trying to control my face. "I can drive."

Suddenly she was sliding over my lap, her hands on the wheel and her foot pushing mine off the gas. She moved into the space between my leg and the door, then shoved me over with her hip. The truck didn't swerve an inch and she was in the driver's seat.

"You wouldn't be able to find the house," she explained.

Lights flared behind us. I jumped, and stared out the back window.

"It's just Archie," she said. She took my hand again.

When I closed my eyes, all I could see was Charlie standing in the doorway.

"The tracker?"

"He caught the end of your performance. He's running behind us now—about a mile back."

My body felt cold. "Can we outrun him?"

"No." But she sped up as she spoke. The truck's engine whined.

My plan wasn't feeling so brilliant anymore.

I was staring back at Archie's headlights when the truck shuddered and a dark shadow sprang up outside the window.

"E—!"

Her hand clamped over my mouth before I could finish shouting the warning.

"It's Emmett!"

She dropped her hand to my knee.

"It's okay, Bella," she promised.

We raced out of town, headed north.

"I didn't realize you were still so bored with small-town life," she said conversationally, and I knew she was trying to distract me. "It seemed like you were adjusting fairly well—especially recently. Maybe I was just flattering myself that I was making life more interesting for you."

"That was below the belt," I confessed, staring at my knees. "Those were the last words my mother said to him when she left. It would have done less damage if I'd punched him."

"He'll forgive you," she promised.

I closed my eyes.

"Bella, it's going to be all right."

I looked down at her. "It won't be all right when we're not together."

"It's only a few days. Don't forget this was your idea."

"That makes it worse. Why did this happen? I don't understand."

She stared at the road ahead, her eyebrows pulling low over her eyes. "It's my fault. I shouldn't have exposed you like that."

I grabbed her hand. "No, that's not what I'm talking about. Okay, I was there. Big deal. It didn't bother the other two. Why did James decide to kill me? There are people all over the place—people who are a lot easier to get to." I glanced over my shoulder at Emmett's shadow. "Why am I worth all this trouble?"

Edythe hesitated, thinking before she answered. "I got a good look at his mind tonight," she said in a low voice. "I'm not sure if there's anything I could have done to avoid this, once he caught your scent. It is partially because of you, the way your blood is... just...” She looked at me from the side of her eye for a second. "If you didn't smell so ridiculously delicious, he might not have bothered. But when I defended you... well, that made it a lot worse. He's not used to being thwarted, no matter how insignificant the object. He thinks of himself as a hunter—as the hunter. His life is consumed with tracking, and a challenge is what he loves best in life. Suddenly we've presented him with an amazing challenge—a large clan of strong fighters, all determined to protect the one vulnerable element. You don't know how euphoric he is right now. It's his favorite game, and we've just created the most exciting round ever." Her tone was full of disgust. She took a deep breath. "But if I had stood by, he would have killed you right then!" she hissed with frustration.

"I thought... I didn't smell the same to the others... as I do to you."

"You don't. But that doesn't mean that you aren't still a temptation to every one of them. If you had appealed to the tracker—or any of them—the same way you appeal to me, it would have meant a fight right there."

I shuddered.

"I don't think I have any choice but to kill him now," she muttered. "Carine won't like it."

"I don't like it," I whispered.

She looked at me, surprised. "You want me to spare him?"

I blinked. "No—I mean, yes. I don't care if he... dies. I mean, that would be a relief, right? I just don't want you... What if you get hurt?"

Her face went soft. "You don't have to worry about me. I don't fight fair."

I could hear the tires cross the bridge, though I couldn't see the river in the dark. I knew we were getting close.

"How do you kill a vampire?" I asked in a low voice.

She glanced at me—her eyes were hard to read. When she spoke her voice was harsh. "The only way to be sure is to tear him to shreds, and then burn the pieces."

"And the other two will fight with him?"

"The woman will. I'm not sure about Laure. They don't have a very strong bond—she's only with them for convenience. She was embarrassed by James’ behavior in the meadow...."

“But James and Victoria—they'll be trying to kill you?" My voice was raw, like I'd sandblasted the back of my throat.

"Stop. You focus on staying safe. You do whatever Archie tells you."

"How am I supposed to not worry about you? What does that even mean—that you don't fight fair?"

She half-smiled. It didn't touch her eyes. "Have you ever tried to act without thinking of that act first? Aside from involuntary muscle actions like breathing and blinking, it's terribly difficult to do. Especially in a fight. I'll see every single thing he plans, every hole in his defense. The only one who can hold his own against me is Archie—since he can see what I decide to do, but then I can hear how he'll react. It's usually a draw. Emmett says it's cheating."

She seemed relaxed—like the idea of fighting the hunter and his partner was the easiest part of this whole mess. It made my stomach twist and plunge.

"Should Archie stay with you, then?" I asked. "If he's a better fighter than the others?"

"Emmett can hear all this, you know. He’s offended, and also not thrilled with that idea. It's been a while since he was allowed to really brawl, no holds barred. He plans to keep me and my cheating ways out of this as much as possible."

That made me feel a little bit better, which wasn't fair to Emmett. I looked over my shoulder again, but I couldn't see his expression.

"Is he still following?" I asked.

Edythe knew I wasn't talking about Emmett. "Yes. He won't attack the house, though. Not tonight."

She turned off onto the invisible drive. Archie's headlights followed. We drove right up to the house. The lights inside were bright, but they didn't do much to light up the surrounding trees. The yard was still black. Emmett had my door open before the truck was stopped. He pulled me out of the seat, ducked under my arm, threw his arm around my waist, than ran me through the front door with my feet a foot off the ground, like I was a giant rag doll.

He burst into the big white room with Edythe and Archie on either side. All of them were there, already on their feet. Laure stood in the middle of their circle. A low snarl rumbled in Emmett’s chest as he set me next to Edythe.

"He’s tracking us," Edythe hissed, glaring at Laure.

Laure’s expression was unhappy. "I was afraid of that."

Archie darted to Jasper’s side and whispered in his ear. They flew up the stairs together. Rosalie watched them, then moved quickly to Emmett's side. Her eyes were intense and—when they flickered unwillingly to my face—hostile.

"What will she do?" Carine asked Laure. 

"I'm sorry," she answered. "I was afraid, when your girl there defended her, that it would set James off."

"Can you stop him?"

Laure shook her head. "Nothing stops James when he gets started."

"We'll stop him,” Emmett promised. There was no doubt what he meant.

"You can't bring him down," Laure answered. "I've never seen anything like him in my three hundred years. He’s absolutely lethal. That's why I joined his coven."

His coven, I thought, of course. That whole show of leadership in the clearing was just that—a show.

Laure was shaking her head. She glanced at me, obviously confused. "Are you sure this is all worth it?"

Edythe's furious growl tore through the room. Laure cringed away from her.

Carine looked at Laure. "I'm afraid you're going to have to make a choice."

Laure understood. She hesitated for a minute. She looked at every face, then at the bright room.

"I'm intrigued by the life you've created here. But I won't get in the middle of this. I bear none of you any enmity, but I won't go up against James. I think I will head north—to that clan in Denali." She paused. "Don't underestimate James. He’s got a brilliant mind and unparalleled senses. He looks wild, but he's every bit as comfortable in the human world as you seem to be. He won't come at you head on.... I'm sorry for what's been unleashed here. Truly sorry." She bowed her head, but I saw her flicker another puzzled look at me.

"Go in peace," Carine said.

Laure took one more long look around the room, and then she disappeared through the door.

The silence lasted less than a second.

Carine looked at Edythe. "How close?"

Esme was already moving. Her hand touched a keypad on the wall, and with a groan, huge metal shutters began sealing up the glass wall. My mouth fell open.

"About three miles out past the river. He’s circling around to meet up with the woman."

"What's the plan?"

"We lead him off, then Archie and Jasper will run her south."

"And then?"

Edythe's voice turned icy. "As soon as Bella is clear, we hunt him."

"I guess he's left us no other choice," Carine agreed, her expression grim.

Edythe looked at Rosalie. "Get her upstairs and trade clothes."

Rosalie stared back at her, incredulous.

"And why would I do that?" She asked. "What is she to me?"

I rolled my eyes, but kept quite. 

"Rose...," Emmett murmured, putting one hand on her shoulder. She shook it off.

My eyes were on Edythe, worried that this would set off her temper, but she surprised me. She looked away from Rosalie like she hadn't spoken, like she didn't exist.

“Esme?" she asked calmly.

"Of course."

As she was speaking, she was already at my side and ducking to grab me in a fireman's hold. We were up the stairs before I could register what was happening.

"What are we doing?" I asked as she set me down in a dark room somewhere off the second-story hall.

"Trying to confuse the scent trail. It won't work for long, but it might give you a head start." Her voice was muffled as she pulled his shirt over her head.

I yanked my sweater off and held it out to her. She switched mine for hers. I struggled to get my arms through the right holes, then yanked my jeans off. We traded. Her pants were a little too long, but otherwise fit fine. She pulled me back to the hall. Esme looked bigger in my clothes; everything was a little too short and tight. Archie was suddenly there; a leather satchel hung over his arm. They each grabbed one of my elbows and flew down the stairs.

It looked like everything had been settled. Edythe and Emmett were ready to leave, Emmett carrying a big backpack over his shoulder. Carine handed something small to Esme. She turned to Archie and handed him the same thing—a tiny silver cell phone.

"Esme and Rosalie will be taking your truck, Bella," she told me as she passed. I nodded, glancing warily at Rosalie. She was glaring at Carine, resentful.

"Archie, Jazz, take the Mercedes. You'll need the dark tint in the South."

They nodded.

"We'll take the Jeep."

Carine stopped next to Edythe. I realized that this was the hunting party, and I felt like I was going to throw up. How did it get to this point? Why had they listened to my idea? It was obviously wrong.

"Archie, will they take the bait?"

Everyone watched Archie as he closed his eyes and became incredibly still. A few seconds later his eyes opened again.

"She'll track you. The man will follow the truck. We'll be able to leave after that." He was positive.

"Let's go," Carine said, heading for the kitchen.

But Edythe came back for me. She stared up at me, her gold eyes huge and deep and full of a million words she didn't have time to say, and reached up to put her hands on my face. I moved close to her, my hands already in her hair. For the shortest second, her lips were icy and hard against mine.

Then it was over. She pushed my shoulders back. Her eyes went blank, dead, just before she turned away from me.

They were gone.

We stood there, no one looking at me while I stared after them. It felt like someone had ripped all the skin off my face. My eyes burned.

The silent moment dragged. Archie's eyes were closed again. Then Esme’s phone vibrated in her hand, and Archie nodded once. The phone flashed to Esme’s ear.

"Now," Esme said. Rosalie stalked out the front door without another glance in my direction, but Esme hugged me softly as she passed.

"Be safe." Her whisper lingered behind them as they slipped out the door. I heard the truck start thunderously, and then the sound faded away.

Jasper and Archie waited. Then Archie lifted his phone to his ear just before it buzzed.

"Edythe says the woman is on Esme’s trail. I'll get the car." He vanished into the shadows the way Edythe had gone.

Jasper and I looked at each other. He stood across the length of the entryway from me.

"You're wrong, you know," he said.

"Huh?"

"I can feel what you're feeling now—and you are worth it."

The feeling of being slowly skinned didn't let up. "If anything happens to them, it will be for nothing," I whispered.

He smiled kindly. "You're wrong," he repeated.

Archie stepped through the front door and walked straight toward me, one arm out.

"May I?" he asked.

"You're the first one to ask permission," I mumbled.

Archie slung me up into a fireman's carry like Esme had and, with Jasper shielding us protectively, flew out the door, leaving the lights on behind us.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Under no circumstances would a Latino father let his seventeen year old daughter leave in the middle of the night for a road trip, but I guess Bella triggered him enough to be too shocked to actually stop her. This would’ve been a whole fight if Bella hadn’t repeated her moms actions. Poor Charlie.


	20. Impatience

When my eyes opened the next day, it took me a lot longer than it should've to realize where I was.

The room was too bland to belong anywhere other than a hotel. The bedside lamps were bolted to the tables, and the drapes were made from the same fabric as the bedspread.

I tried to remember how I'd gotten to this room, but nothing came at first.

I remembered the black car, the glass in the windows darker than that on a limousine. The engine was almost silent, though we'd raced across the black freeways at more than twice the legal limit.

And I remembered Archie on the seat next to me, rather than up front with Jasper. I remembered realizing suddenly that he was there as my bodyguard, that the front seat was apparently not close enough. It should have made the danger seem more real, but it all felt a million miles away. The danger I was in personally wasn't the danger I was worried about.

I made Archie keep up a strange stream-of-consciousness future watch all night long. There weren't any details so small they didn't interest me. He'd told me turn by turn how Edythe, Carine, and Emmett would be moving through the forest, and though I didn't know any of the landmarks he referenced, I'd been riveted by every word. And then he would go back and describe the same sequence differently, as some decision remapped the future. This happened repeatedly, and it was impossible to follow, but I didn't care. As long as the future never put Edythe and James in the same place, I'd been able to keep breathing.

Sometimes he would switch to Esme for me. Esme and Rosalie were in my truck, heading east. Which meant the red-haired woman was still on their trail.

Archie had a more difficult time seeing my dad. "Humans are harder than vampires," he told me. And I'd remembered that Edythe had said something to me about that once. It had seemed like years ago, when it had been only days. I remembered being disoriented by the way I couldn't make sense of the time.

I remembered the sun coming up over a low peak somewhere in California. The light had stung my eyes, but I'd tried not to close them. When I did, the images that flashed behind my lids like still slides were too much. I'd rather my eyes burn than see them again. Dad's broken expression... Edythe's bared teeth... Rosalie's furious glare... the red eyes of the tracker staring at me... the dead look in Edythe's eyes when she'd turned away from me...

I kept my eyes open, and the sun moved across the sky.

I remembered my head feeling heavy and light at the same time as we raced through a shallow mountain pass and the sun, behind us now, reflected off the tiled rooftops of my hometown. I hadn't had enough emotion left to be surprised that we'd made a three-day journey in one. I'd stared blankly at the city laid out in front of us, realizing slowly that it was supposed to mean something to me. The scrubby creosote, the palm trees, the green golf course amoebas, the turquoise splotches of swimming pools—these were supposed to be familiar. I was supposed to feel like I was home.

But home to me was now a bronze haired girl with golden eyes. And my heart ached to be home. To protect her from those who wanted to burn us down.

The shadows of the streetlights had slanted across the freeway with lines that were sharper than I remembered. So little darkness. There was no place to hide in these shadows.

"Which way to the airport?" Jasper had asked—the first time he'd spoken since we'd gotten in the car.

"Stay on the I-ten," I'd answered automatically. "We'll pass right by it."

It had taken me a few seconds more to process the implications of his question. My brain was foggy with exhaustion.

"Are we flying somewhere?" I'd asked Archie. I couldn't think of the plan. This didn't sound right, though.

"No, but it's better to be close, just in case."

I remembered starting the loop around Sky Harbor International... but not ending it. That must have been when my brain had finally crashed.

Though, now that I'd chased the memories down, I did have a vague impression of leaving the car—the sun behind the horizon, my arm wrapped around Archie's shoulder, as he carried me through the warm, dry shadows.

I had no memory of this room.

I looked at the digital clock on the nightstand. The red numbers claimed it was three o'clock, but there was no way to tell if that meant a.m. or p.m. No light showed around the edges of the thick curtains, but the room was bright with the light from the lamps.

I rose stiffly and staggered to the window, pulling back the drapes.

It was dark outside. Three in the morning, then. The room looked out on a deserted section of the freeway and the new long-term parking garage for the airport. It made me feel better—by a very small amount—to be able to pinpoint time and place.

I looked down. I was still wearing Esme's shirt and too-long pants. I looked around the room and was glad when I saw my duffel bag on top of the low dresser.

I was changing into a pair of my favorite swears when a light tap on the door made me jump.

"Can I come in?" Archie asked.

I took a deep breath. "Sure."

He walked in and looked me over. "You look like you could sleep longer."

I shook my head.

He darted silently to the window and pulled the curtains shut.

"We'll need to stay inside," he told me.

"Okay." My voice was hoarse; it cracked.

"Thirsty?" he asked.

I shrugged. "I'm okay. How about you?"

He smiled. "Nothing unmanageable. I ordered some food for you—it's in the front room. Edythe reminded me that you have to eat a lot more frequently than we do."

I was instantly more alert. "She called?"

"No." He watched my face fall. "It was before we left. She gave me lots of instructions. Come eat something."

He was out of the room before I could protest that I wasn't hungry. I followed slowly behind him.

There was a living room attached to the bedroom. A low buzz of voices was coming from the TV. Jasper sat at the desk in the corner, his eyes on the TV, but no interest in his expression. Archie went to stand by him. He ran his hand over his honey-colored hair.

"What's the latest?" I asked.

"Esme and Rosalie are back in Forks. The redhead gave up chasing them."

I opened my mouth, but Archie was faster.

"They're watching your father. The redhead won't get past them."

"What is she doing?"

"Working her way through town, looking for you as far as I can tell—she spent some time at the school."

My eyes bulged. "Did she hurt anyone?"

Archie shook his head. "They seem pretty committed to the hunt they already started."

"Edythe?"

"Frustrated, it looks like. They turned on the tracker, but he was already running. He's kept going north. They're chasing him."

I stood there, not sure what to do.

Edythe was chasing James. Sure, she had Carine and Emmett with her, but Edythe was the fastest....

"Eat something, Bella. Edythe gets really difficult when she thinks her instructions aren't being followed to the letter."

There was a tray on the coffee table with a couple of stainless-steel covers over the plates on it. I didn't feel hungry, but I knew I had to eat. Survival and all. I sat on the floor next to the table and pulled off the first plate cover. I didn't look at the food, I just grabbed something and started eating. My stomach was suddenly awake at the first bite but my taste buds weren't.

They were quiet and motionless while I ate. I stared at the TV, but I couldn't make sense of what was happening. Was it a news show? Was it an infomercial? I wasn't sure. I ate until the plates were empty. I didn't taste any of it.

When there was nothing left to eat, I stared at the wall.

All I could see was Edythe in the forest, faster than a cheetah—faster than a bullet. It was obvious she would catch up with the tracker first.

Laure's words echoed in my head. You can't bring him down. He's absolutely lethal.

Suddenly Jasper was standing over me, closer than usual.

"Bella," he said in a soothing voice. "You have nothing to worry about. You are completely safe here."

"I know."

"Then why are you frightened?" He sounded confused. He might feel my emotions, but he couldn't see the reasons behind them.

"You heard what Laure said. James is lethal. What if something goes wrong, and they get separated? If anything happens, if Carine or Emmett—or Edythe—" My voice broke. "If that crazy redhead hurts Esme—I just want everyone to be safe. I want Edythe to be safe, and—"

"Stop, Bella, stop," he interrupted, his words pouring out so quickly they were hard to understand. "You're worrying about all the wrong things, Bella. Trust me on this—none of us are in jeopardy. You are under enough strain as it is; don't add to it with imaginary worries. Listen to me!" He ordered—I'd looked away. "Our family is strong. Our only fear is losing you."

"But why should you—"

Archie was there then, his arm around Jasper's waist. "It's been almost a century that Edythe's been alone. Now she's found you. You can't see the changes that we see, we who have been with her for so long. Do you think any of us want to look into her eyes for the next hundred years if she loses you?"

My fears started to ease. But even though the calm that spread over me felt totally natural, like it came from inside, I knew better.

"You know I'd do this anyway," Archie added. "Even if Edythe hadn't asked me to."

"Why?"

He grinned. "It's hard to explain without sounding slightly insane.... Time doesn't mean the same thing to me that it does to you—or Jazz, or anyone else." Jasper grinned and tweaked his ear. "So, this won't make sense to you. But for me, it's like we've already been friends for a long time, Bella. The first second you became a part of Edythe's life, for me it was like we'd already spent hundreds of hours together. We've laughed at Edythe's overreactions together, we've annoyed Rosalie right out of the house together, we've stayed up all night talking with Carine together...."

I stared and he shrugged. "It's how I experience the world."

"We're friends?" I asked, my voice full of wonder.

"Best friends," he told me. "Someday. It was nice of my favorite sister, don't you think, to fall in love with my best friend? I guess I owe her one."

"Huh," was all I could think to say.

Archie laughed.

Jasper rolled his eyes. "Thanks so much, Archie. I just got her calm."

"No, I'm good," I promised. Archie could be lying to make me feel better, but either way it worked. It wasn't so bad if Archie wanted to help me, too. If he wasn't just doing it for Edythe.

"So, what do we do now?" I asked.

"We wait for something to change."

It was a very long day.

We stayed in the room. Archie called down to the front desk and asked them to suspend our housekeeping service. The curtains stayed shut, the TV on, though no one watched it. At regular intervals, food was delivered for me.

It was funny how I was suddenly comfortable with Archie. It was like his vision of our friendship, spoken out loud, had made it real. He sat in the chair next to the sofa where I sprawled and answered all the questions I'd been too nervous to ask before. Sometimes he'd answer them before I asked them. It was a little weird, but I figured that was how everyone else felt around Edythe all the time.

"Yes," he said, when I thought about asking him that. "It's exactly the same. She tries hard not to be obnoxious about it."

He told me about waking up.

"I only remembered one thing, but I'm not even sure it was a memory. I thought I remembered someone saying my name—calling me Archie. But maybe I was remembering something that hadn't happened yet—seeing that someday someone would call me Archie." He smiled at my expression. "I know, it's a circular dilemma, isn't it?"

"The hair?" He ran a hand over his scalp, unselfconscious. The stubble was just long enough to see that his hair would have been dark brown, nearly black, like his eyebrows. "It was a rather extreme look for 1920. A little too early for me to have been a skinhead, thank heavens. My best guess is disease or bad behavior."

"Bad behavior?" I asked.

He shrugged. "I might have been in prison."

"You couldn't have been much older than me," I protested.

He steepled his fingers thoughtfully. "I like to believe that if I was a criminal, I was both a mastermind and a prodigy."

Jasper—back at the desk and mostly silent—laughed with me.

"It wasn't confusing the way it probably should have been," Archie said when I asked him what his first visions were like. "It seemed normal—I knew what I was seeing hadn't happened. I think maybe I'd seen things before I was changed. Or maybe I just adapt quickly." He smiled, already knowing the question I had waiting. "It was Jazz. He was the first thing I saw." And then, "No, I didn't actually meet him in person until much later."

Something about his tone made me wonder. "How long?"

"Twenty-eight years."

"Twenty-eight...? You had to wait twenty-eight years? But couldn't you...?"

He nodded. "I could have found him earlier. I knew where he was. But he wasn't ready for me yet. If I'd come too early, he would have killed me."

I gasped and stared at him. He raised an eyebrow at me, and I looked back at Archie. He laughed.

"But Edythe said you were the only one who could hold your own against her—?"

Jasper hissed—not like he was mad, like he was annoyed. I glanced at him again and he was rolling his eyes.

"We'll never know," Archie said. "If Jazz was really trying to kill Edythe, rather than just playing...? Well, Jazz has a lot of experience. Seeing the future isn't the only reason why I can keep up with Edythe—it's also because it was Jazz who taught me how to fight. Laure's coven all had their eyes on Emmett—he's pretty spectacular, I grant you. But if it had come to a fight, Emmett wouldn't have been their problem. If they'd taken a closer look at my darling"—he blew him a kiss—"they would have forgotten all about the strong man."

I remembered the first time I'd seen Jasper, in the cafeteria with his family. Beautiful, like the others, but with that edge. Even before I'd put it into words inside my own head, I'd sensed there was something about him that matched up with what Archie was telling me now.

I looked at Archie.

"You can ask him," he said. "But it's not going to happen."

"He wants to know my story?" Jasper guessed. He laughed once—it was a dark sound. "You're not ready for that, Bella. Believe me."

And though I was still curious, I did believe him.

"You said humans were harder... but you seem to see me pretty well," I noted.

"I'm paying attention, and you're right here," Archie said. "Also, the two-second head starts are simpler than the weather. It's the long term that won't hold still. Even an hour complicates things."

Archie kept me updated on what was happening with the others—which was mostly nothing. James was good at running away. There were tricks, Archie told me. Scents couldn't be tracked through water, for example. James seemed to know the tricks. A half dozen times the trail took them back toward Forks, only to race off in the other direction again. Twice Archie called Carine to give her instructions. Once it was something about the direction in which James had jumped off a cliff, the other time it was where they would find his scent on the other side of a river. From the way he described it, he wasn't seeing the hunter, he was seeing Edythe and Carine. I guessed he would see his family the most clearly. I wanted to ask for the phone, but I knew there wasn't time for me to hear Edythe's voice. They were hunting.

I also knew I was supposed to be rooting for Edythe and the others to succeed, but I could only feel relieved as the distance between her and James got larger, despite Archie's help. If it meant I would be stuck here in this hotel room forever, I wouldn't complain. Whatever kept her safe.

There was one question that I wanted to ask more than the others, but I hesitated. I think if Jasper hadn't been there, I might have done it sooner. I didn't feel the same ease in his presence that I did now with Archie. Which was probably only because he wasn't trying to make me feel that way.

When I was eating—dinner? Maybe, I couldn't remember which meal I was on—I was thinking about different ways to ask. And then I caught a look on Archie's face, and I knew that he already knew what I was trying to ask, and unlike my dozens of other questions, he was choosing not to answer this one.

My eyes narrowed.

"Was this on Edythe's lists of instructions?" I asked sourly.

I thought I heard a very faint sigh from Jasper's corner. It was probably annoying listening to half a conversation. But she should be used to that. I'd bet Edythe and Archie never had to speak out loud at all when they talked to each other.

"It was implied," Archie answered.

I thought about their fight in the Jeep. Was this what it was about?

"I don't suppose our future friendship is enough to shift your loyalties?"

He frowned. "Edythe is my sister."

"Even if you disagree with her on this?"

We stared at each other for a minute.

"That's what you saw," I realized. I felt my eyes get bigger. "And then she got so upset. You already saw it, didn't you?"

"It was only one future among many. I also saw you die," he reminded me.

"But you saw it. It's a possibility."

He shrugged.

"Don't you think I deserve to know, then? Even if there's only the slightest chance?"

He stared at me, deliberating.

"You do," he finally said. "You have the right to know."

I waited.

"You don't know fury like Edythe when she's thwarted," he warned me.

"It's none of her business. This is between you and me. As your friend, I'm begging you."

He paused, then made his choice. "I can tell you the mechanics of it, but I don't remember it myself, and I've never done it or seen it done, so keep in mind that I can only tell you the theory."

"How does someone become a vampire?"

"Oh, is that all?" Jasper muttered behind me. I'd forgotten he was listening.

I waited.

"As predators," Archie began, "we have a glut of weapons in our physical arsenal—much, much more than we need for hunting easy prey like humans. Strength, speed, acute senses, not to mention those of us like Edythe, Jasper, and me who have extra senses as well. And then, like a carnivorous flower, we are physically attractive to our prey."

I was seeing it all in my head again—how Edythe had illustrated the same concept for me in the meadow.

He smiled wide—his teeth glistened. "We have one more, fairly superfluous weapon. We're also venomous. The venom doesn't kill—it's merely incapacitating. It works slowly, spreading through the bloodstream, so that, once bitten, our prey is in too much physical pain to escape us. Mostly superfluous, as I said. If we're that close, our prey doesn't escape. Of course, unless we want it to."

"Carine," I said quietly. The holes in the story Edythe had told me were filling themselves in. "So... if the venom is left to spread...?"

"It takes a few days for the transformation to be complete, depending on how much venom is in the bloodstream, how close the venom enters to the heart—Carine's creator bit her on the hand on purpose to make it worse. As long as the heart keeps beating, the poison spreads, healing, changing the body as it moves through it. Eventually the heart stops, and the conversion is finished. But all that time, every minute of it, a victim would be wishing for death—screaming for it."

I shuddered.

"It's not pleasant, no."

"Edythe said it was very hard to do... but that sounds simple enough."

"We're also like sharks in a way. Once we taste blood, or even smell it for that matter, it becomes very hard to keep from feeding. Impossible, even. So, you see, to actually bite someone, to taste the blood, it would begin the frenzy. It's difficult on both sides—the bloodlust on the one hand, the awful pain on the other."

"It sounds like something you would remember," I said.

"For everyone else, the pain of transformation is the sharpest memory they have of their human life. I don't know why I'm different."

Archie stared past me, motionless. I wondered what it would be like, not to know who you were. To look in the mirror and not recognize the person looking back.

It was hard for me to believe that Archie could have been a criminal, though; there was something intrinsically good about his face. Rosalie was the showy one, the one the people at school stared at, but there was something better than perfection about Archie's face. It was totally pure.

"There are positives to being different," Archie said suddenly. "I don't remember anyone I left behind. I got to skip that pain, too." He looked at me, and his eyes narrowed a little bit. "Carine, Edythe, and Esme all lost everyone who mattered to them before they left being human behind. So, there was grief, but not regret. It was different for the others. The physical pain is a quick thing, comparatively, Bella. There are slower ways to suffer...."

"Rosalie had parents who loved her and depended on her—two little sisters she adored. She could never see them again after she was changed. And then she outlived them all. That kind of pain is very, very slow."

I wondered if he was trying to make me feel bad for Rosalie—to cut the girl some slack even if she hated me for some unknown reason. Well... it was working.

But that wasn't it. I understood what he was telling me.

He was perfectly still again. I put my arm behind my head and stared up at the ceiling.

If... if ever, someday, I wanted to be that way... to be a vampire… what would that mean for mom? What would that mean for dad?

There were so many things to think about. Things I didn't even know I didn't know to think about.

But some things seemed obvious. For whatever reason, Edythe didn't want me thinking about any of this. Why? It hurt my stomach when I tried to come up with an answer to that question.

She doesn't want me to be like her, is my best guess. And I had a feeling it's because of her own self-hatred for what she is. I sank further and further into my thoughts.

Then Archie sprang to his feet.

I looked up at him, startled by the sudden movement, then alarmed again when I saw his face.

It was totally blank—empty, his mouth half open.

Then Jasper was there, gently pushing him back into the chair.

"What do you see?" he asked in a low, soothing voice.

"Something's changed," Archie said, even more quietly.

I leaned closer.

"What is it?"

"A room. It's long—there are mirrors everywhere. The floor is wood. The tracker is in the room, and he's waiting. There's a gold stripe across the mirrors."

"Where is the room?"

"I don't know. Something is missing—another decision hasn't been made yet."

"How much time?"

"It's soon. He'll be in the mirror room today, or maybe tomorrow. It all depends. He's waiting for something." His face went blank again. "And he's in the dark now."

Jasper's voice was calm, methodical. "What is he doing?"

"He's watching TV... no, he's running a VCR, in the dark, in another place."

"Can you see where he is?"

"No, the space is too dark."

"And the mirror room, what else is there?"

"Just the mirrors, and the gold. It's a band, around the room. And there's a black table with a big stereo, and a TV. He's touching the VCR there, but he doesn't watch the way he does in the dark room. This is the room where he waits." His eyes drifted, then focused on Jasper's face.

"There's nothing else?"

He shook his head. They looked at each other, motionless.

"What does it mean?" I asked.

Neither of them answered for a moment, then Jasper looked at me.

"It means the tracker's plans have changed. He's made a decision that will lead him to the mirror room, and the dark room."

"But we don't know where those rooms are?"

"No."

"But we do know that he won't be in the mountains north of Washington, being hunted. He'll elude them." Archie's voice was bleak.

He picked up the phone just as it vibrated.

"Carine," he said. And then he glanced at me. "Yes." He listened for another long moment, then said, "I just saw him." He described the vision like he had for Jasper. "Whatever made him take that plane... it was leading him to those rooms." He paused. "Yes."

He held out the phone to me. "Bella?"

I yanked it out of his hand. "Hello?"

"Bella," Edythe breathed.

"Oh, Edythe," I breathed a sigh of relief. "Where are you?"

"Outside of Vancouver. I'm sorry, Bella—we lost him. He seems suspicious of us—he stays just far enough away that I can't hear him. He's gone now—looks like he stole a small plane. We think he's heading back to Forks to start over."

I could hear Archie filling Jasper in behind me.

"I know. Archie saw that he got away."

"You don't have to worry, though. You've left no trail for him to follow. You just have to stay with Archie and wait till we find him again. Archie will get a lead on him soon enough."

"I'll be fine. Is Esme with my dad?"

"Yes—the woman has been in town. She went to the house, but while Charlie was at work. She hasn't gone near your father. Don't worry—Charlie's safe with Esme and Rosalie watching."

Somehow, Rosalie's presence didn't comfort me much.

"What do you think Victoria is doing?"

"Trying to pick up the trail. She's been all through the area during the night. Rosalie traced her up to the airport in Port Angeles, all the roads around town, the school... she's digging, Bella, but there's nothing to find."

"And you're sure dad's safe?"

"Yes. Esme won't let him out of her sight. I'll be there soon. If the tracker gets anywhere near Forks, I'll have him."

I swallowed. "Be careful. Stay with Carine and Emmett."

"I know what I'm doing."

"I miss you," I said.

"I know, believe me, I know. It's like you've taken half of myself away with you."

"Come and get it, then, and bring back the other half of me."

"As soon as I possibly can. I will make this right first." Her voice got hard.

"I love you."

"I love you, too. So much."

"Good,"

"I'll come for you soon."

"I'll wait for you."

The phone went dead, and a sudden wave of depression crashed over me. Jasper looked up sharply, and the feeling dissipated.

Jasper went back to watching Archie. He was on the couch, leaning over the table with the free hotel pen in his hand. I walked over to see what he was doing.

He was sketching on a piece of hotel stationery. I leaned on the back of the couch, looking over his shoulder.

He drew a room: long, rectangular, with a thinner, square section at the back. He drew lines to show how the wooden planks that made up the floor stretched lengthwise across the room. Down the walls were more lines denoting the breaks in the mirrors. I hadn't been picturing them like that—covering the whole wall that way. And then, wrapping around the walls, waist high, a long band. The band Archie said was gold.

"It's a ballet studio," I said, suddenly recognizing the familiar shapes.

They both looked up at me, surprised.

"Do you know this room?" Jasper's voice sounded calm, but there was an undercurrent to it. Archie leaned closer to the paper, his hand flying across the page now. An emergency exit took shape against the back wall just where I knew it would be; the stereo and TV filled in the right corner foreground.

"It looks like a place where my mom used to teach dance lessons—she didn't stick with it for very long. It was shaped just the same." I touched the page where the square section jutted out, narrowing the back part of the room. "That's where the bathrooms were—the doors were through the other dance floor. But the stereo was here"—I pointed to the left corner—"it was older, and there wasn't a TV. There was a window in the waiting room—you could see the room from this perspective if you looked through it."

Archie and Jasper were staring at me.

"Are you sure it's the same room?" Jasper asked with the same unnatural calm.

"No, not at all. I mean, most dance studios would look the same—the mirrors, the bar." I leaned over the couch and traced my finger along the ballet bar set against the mirrors. "It's just the shape that looked familiar."

"Would you have any reason to go there now?" Archie asked.

"No. I haven't been back since my mom quit—it's probably been ten years."

"So, there's no way it could be connected with you?" Archie asked intently.

I shook my head. "I don't even think the same person owns it. I'm sure it's just another dance studio, somewhere else."

"Where was the studio your mother went to?" Jasper asked, his voice much more casual than Archie's.

"Just around the corner from our house. It's why she took the job—so I could meet her there when I walked home from school...." My voice trailed off as I watched the look they exchanged.

"Here in Phoenix, then?" He asked, still casual.

"Yes," I whispered. "Fifty-eighth and Cactus."

We all stared in silence at the drawing.

"Archie, is that phone safe?" I asked.

"The number just traces back to Washington," he told me.

"Then I can use it to call my mom."

"She's in Florida, right? She should be safe there."

"She is—but she's coming home soon, and she can't come back to that house while..." A tremor ran through my voice. I was thinking about Victoria searching Dad's house, the school in Forks where my records were.

"What's her number?" Archie asked. He had the phone in his hand.

"They don't have a permanent number except at the house. She's supposed to check her messages regularly."

"Jazz?" Archie asked.

He thought about it. "I don't think it could hurt—don't say where you are, obviously."

I nodded, reaching for the phone. I dialed the familiar number, then waited through four rings until my mother's breezy voice came on, telling me to leave a message.

"Mom," I said after the beep, "it's me. Listen, I need you to do something. It's important. As soon as you get this message, call me at this number." Archie pointed to the number already written on the bottom of his picture. I read it carefully, twice. "Please don't go anywhere until you talk to me. Don't worry, I'm okay, but I have to talk to you right away, no matter how late you get this call, all right? I love you, Mom. Bye." I closed my eyes and prayed that no unforeseen change of plans would bring her home before she got my message.

Then we were back to waiting.

I thought about calling dad, but I wasn't sure what I could say. I watched the news, concentrating now, watching for stories about Florida, or about spring training—strikes or hurricanes or Florida man exhibiting bizarre behavior—anything that might send them home early.

It seemed like immortality granted endless patience, too. Neither Jasper nor Archie seemed to feel the need to do anything at all. For a while, Archie sketched the vague outline of the dark room from his vision, as much as he could see in the light from the TV. But when he was done, he simply sat, looking at the blank walls. Jasper, too, seemed to have no urge to pace, or to peek through the curtains, or to punch holes in the wall, the way I did.

I fell asleep on the couch, waiting for the phone to ring.


	21. Phone Call

I woke up too early, my sleep schedule was already thrown off balance. The TV was on—the only light in the room—but the sound was muted. The clock on the wall said it was just after two in the morning. I could hear the sound of quiet voices speaking too quickly, and I figured that was what had woken me. I lay still on the couch for a minute, waiting for my eyes and ears to adjust.

I realized that it was strange that they were talking loud enough to wake me, and I sat up.

Archie was leaning over the desk, Jasper next to him with his hand on his back. Archie was sketching again.

I got up and walked over to them. Neither one of them looked up, too engrossed in Archie's work.

I went around to Archie's other side to see.

"He saw something else," I said quietly to Jasper.

"Something's brought the tracker back to the room with the VCR, but it's light now," he answered.

I watched as Archie drew a square room with dark beams across its low ceiling. The walls were paneled in wood, a little too dark, out of date. The floor had a dark carpet with a pattern in it. There was a large window against the south wall, and an opening through the west wall led to the living room. One side of that entrance was stone—a large tan stone fireplace that was open to both rooms. The focus of the room from this perspective, the TV and VCR, balanced on a too-small wooden stand, were in the southwest corner of the room. An old sectional sofa curved around in front of the TV, a round coffee table in front of it.

"The phone goes there," I whispered, pointing.

They both stared at me.

"That's my mom's house."

Archie was across the room, phone in hand, dialing. I stared at the faithful rendering of my family room. Uncharacteristically, Jasper slid closer to me. He lightly touched his hand to my shoulder, and the physical contact seemed to make his calming influence stronger. The panic stayed dull, unfocused.

Archie's lips blurred; he was talking so fast—his voice was just a low buzzing impossible to understand.

"Bella," he said. I looked at him numbly.

"Bella, Edythe is coming. She and Emmett and Carine are going to take you somewhere, hide you for a while."

"Okay,” I said, the blood in my veins was cold. I barely could hear him through the horror.

"She’s catching the first flight out of Seattle. We'll meet her at the airport, and you'll leave with her."

"But—my mom! He came here for my mom, Archie!" Even with Jasper touching me, I could feel the panic seizing up my chest.

"Jazz and I will stay till she's safe again."

"We can't win, Archie! You can't guard everyone I know forever. Don't you see what he's doing? He's not even tracking me. He'll find someone—he'll hurt someone I love! Archie, I can't—"

"We'll catch him, Bella."

"And what if you get hurt, Archie? Do you think that's okay with me? Do you think it's only my human family he can hurt me with?"

Archie raised his eyebrows at Jasper. A heavy fog of exhaustion washed over me, and my eyes closed without my permission. I struggled against the fog, knowing what was happening. I forced my eyes open and stepped away from Jasper's hand.

"I don't need sleep," I snapped. "And don't you fucking dare do that to me again,"

I went back to the bedroom, slamming the door behind me. Archie didn't follow me, the way I half-expected him to. Maybe he could see what his reception would be.

For almost four hours I sat on the floor and stared at the wall, my hands clenched into fists. My mind went around in circles, trying to come up with some way out of this nightmare. I couldn't see any escape—just one possible end. The only question was how many other people would get hurt before I reached it.

The only hope I had left was knowing that I would see Edythe soon. Maybe, if I could see her face again, I would be able to see a solution, too. Things were always clearer when we were together.

When the phone rang, I went back to the front room, unashamed of my behavior. I hoped I hadn't offended anyone, but Jasper had offended me. So, we were even. I also hoped they realized that I was nothing but grateful for the sacrifices they were making for me.

Archie was talking at high speed into the phone again. I looked around, but Jasper was gone. The clock said it was five-thirty in the morning.

"They're just boarding their plane," Archie told me. "They'll land at nine-forty-five."

Just a few more hours to keep myself together till she was here.

"Where's Jasper?"

"He went to check out."

"You aren't staying here?"

"No, we're relocating closer to your mother's house."

I felt like I wanted to throw up, but then the phone rang again. Archie looked at the number, then held it out to me. I yanked it from his hand.

"Mami?"

"Bella? Bella?" It was my mom's voice—that familiar tone I'd heard a thousand times in my childhood, anytime I'd gotten too close to the edge of the sidewalk or strayed out of her sight in a crowded place. It was the sound of panic.

"Calm down, Ma," I said in my most soothing voice, walking slowly away from Archie, back to the bedroom. I wasn't sure if I could lie convincingly with him watching. "Everything is fine, okay? Just give me a minute and I'll explain everything, I promise."

I paused, surprised that she hadn't interrupted me yet.

"Ma?"

"Be very careful not to say anything until I tell you to." The voice I heard now was as unfamiliar as it was unexpected. It was a man's voice. It was a deep dark sounding voice. He spoke quickly.

A chill ran up my spine, and I turned eyes wide as I looked into Archie’s questioning ones.

"Now, I don't need to hurt your mother, so please do exactly as I say, and she'll be fine." He paused for a minute while I listened in mute horror. "That's very good," he congratulated. "Now repeat after me and do try to sound natural. Please say, 'No, Mom, stay where you are.'"

"No, Mom, stay where you are." My voice was barely more than a whisper.

"I can see this is going to be difficult." The voice was amused, still light and friendly. "Why don't you walk into another room now, so your face doesn't ruin everything? There's no reason for your mother to suffer. As you're walking, say, 'Mom, please listen to me.' Say it now."

"Mom, please listen to me," I pleaded, as I pulled the phone away from my ear as I talked, my shaking finger pressing the speaker phone icon.

"There now, are you alone? Just answer yes or no." The hunter spoke, his voice sounded like he was in the room.

"Yes." I looked at Archie as I played along, his face was hard and concentrated as he listened.

"But they can still hear you, I'm sure."

"Yes."

"All right, then," the agreeable voice continued, "say, 'Mom, trust me.'"

"Mom, trust me."

"This worked out rather better than I expected. I was prepared to wait, but your mother arrived ahead of schedule. It's easier this way, isn't it? Less suspense, less anxiety for you."

I waited.

"Now I want you to listen very carefully. I'm going to need you to get away from your friends; do you think you can do that? Answer yes or no."

"No."

"I'm sorry to hear that. I was hoping you would be a little more creative. Do you think you could get away from them if your mother's life depended on it? Answer yes or no."

Somehow, there had to be a way.

"Yes," I said through my teeth.

"Very good, Bella. Now this is what you have to do. I want you to go to your mother's house. Next to the phone there will be a number. Call it, and I'll tell you where to go from there." If I were an idiot, I would follow his instructions but he is powerful. A creature who a mere human like myself had no power against. But I have powerful friends. A new family who would help protect my own. "Can you do that? Answer yes or no."

"Yes."

"Before noon, please, Bella. I haven't got all day," he said.

"Where's Phil?" I hissed.

"Ah, be careful now, Bella. Wait until I ask you to speak, please."

I waited.

"It's important that you don't make your friends suspicious when you go back to them. Tell them that your mother called, and that you talked her out of coming home for the time being. Now repeat after me, 'Thank you, Mom.' Say it now."

"Thank you, Mom."

"Say, 'I love you, Mom, I'll see you soon.' Say it now."

"I love you, Mom," I said monotonously. "I'll see you soon," I promised.

"Goodbye, Bella. I look forward to seeing you again." He hung up.

I held the phone to my ear. My joints were frozen with horror—I couldn't unbend my fingers to drop it.

I knew I had to think, but my head was filled with the sound of my mother's panic. Seconds ticked by while I fought for control.

“Give me the phone, Bella,” Archie’s voice brought me back.

I clutched the phone and shook my head.

Slowly, slowly, my thoughts started to break past that brick wall of pain.

Not to plan my escape, no... all of Archie's visions. “Archie, everything you saw… it all makes sense now… Victoria searching my school, she must’ve found my records… my previous address. James, he probably took the stolen plane here, he had to have figured out that I was here. That’s why you saw my house, he was there and he heard my message to my mom… Mami! She couldn’t have come home early…” I trailed off laughing once, “She’s never on schedule, hell, she’s always behind schedule… but her voice… that was her…”

“Unless it wasn’t.” Archie laughed, “Do you keep home movies at home?”

“He’s good, if you couldn’t see the future and if I didn’t know my mom. I definitely would’ve believed him… I would’ve sprung his trap.” I shook my head.

“Maybe you should.”

I looked at him, half amused, half in disapproval, "Edythe would kill me,"

"So, we don't tell her."

"She'll kill you," I stated as a mischievous smile crept up on my face.

He nodded in agreement, “Edythe would never put you in danger in order to end this,”

“And it has to stop, this game needs to come to an end and we have him now. He’s cocky as fuck. Taking on a bigger clan who he knows nothing about.”

"Jasper's back," he states and a few seconds later Jasper walks through the door.

"Good. Maybe he has some ideas," I said.

"Bella, I'm sorry about—" Jasper began as soon as he saw me.

I waved my hand, "it's forgotten,"

Me and Archie filled Jasper in quickly. He was shocked at how I managed to put the pieces together, suggesting we should clue the others in, but I was firm on not letting that happen.

"We can't. Edythe would never allow this to happen, I need a head start, but not by more than a few seconds. You guys have to be right behind me before he gets the chance to—you know— kill me." I said.

He looked at me like I had lost my mind.

Archie sighed, "I know. Leave it to Edythe to fall in love with someone who's fucking nuts,"

"This was your idea! I simply agreed, because this being hunted thing and putting my family at risk is not something I’m willing to do forever,” anxiety was building in my chest at the thought of being on run for however long it took him to catch up.

Jasper looked away from me, “What do you see?”

“I already know the plan,” Archie smiled at him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dear Canon Bella,
> 
> How the fuck did you not see it? 
> 
> Love, Mar.


	22. Her Game

It's funny how just a few hours ago I was feeling depressed and helpless. It definitely had something to do with the love of my life hunting down a psychotic vampire who was in turn hunting me. It also had to do with the fact that while said love of my life and her family were risking their lives and safety in order to protect me and my family, I was stuck in a hotel room with a psychic and an empath doing absolutely nothing to help.

But now the game was finally in my favor. And me, the psychic and the empath were going to ensure our victory over the villain. We just had to hope that not only did our plan worked flawlessly but that we would also survive Edythe's wrath once the hunter was dead.

"There are three possible futures right now. One, you leave five seconds too early and end up in the hospital, two, you leave five seconds too late and you end up a vampire and three, you leave just in time and we catch up with you before James has the chance to even touch you." 

I nodded my head slowly as I listened to my possible futures being listed. My head spun; this was just fucking weird. I never thought I would ever be in a situation where I knew the outcome of my fate. Or three possible outcomes. 

"What if I leave in time but you guys don't?" I asked. 

Archie raised an eyebrow, "I don't see us being late." 

"But that could change, right?" 

Jasper answered, "It could, that's why you should let me go with you," 

I shook my head, "We already agreed that he would be watching me too closely not to notice you following. We'll just have to make sure we're all on time... I hope the pilot doesn't fuck up, even he's responsible for my future."

"It's disorienting isn't it? Knowing." Archie's face was soft, his eyes met mine and I remembered what he had said.

Time doesn't mean the same thing to me that it does to you. 

"At least the future where you die is slipping farther away, the odds are in your favor, Bella," he continued, "Take comfort in knowing that,"

I looked away as I got up, "I need a shower,"

I turned and walked slowly to the bedroom, feeling their eyes following the whole way. I shut the door behind me and turned to the bathroom. I showered and got dressed in comfortable clothes, yoga pants and a sports bra. I needed to be able to move. Who knows? Maybe I could actually outrun a vampire. I dug through the duffel bag until I found my sock full of money—I emptied it into my pocket.

I let my mind wonder as I was tying my sneakers, trying to think of how Edythe might react if I ended up dead. If the universe wasn't betting on me surviving this crazy plan.

I knelt by the little bedside table and opened the top drawer. Underneath the complimentary copy of the Bible, there was a stash of stationery and a pen. I took a sheet of paper and an envelope out of the drawer.

"Edythe," I wrote. My hand was shaking. The letters were barely legible.

I love you.

Sorry—again. So sorry.

But, I'm in control now. And I decided I can't live my life running in fear of what lurks in the shadows. It has to stop. I know it may not work. I am so very, very sorry. 

Don't be mad at Archie and Jasper. They're doing their part in helping me keep the people that I love safe. I don't know what I would've done if he had actually managed to catch my mom.

I'm writing this in case the future turns on me. 

Someone once told me the future is subjective. It can always change. But my future with you is already set in stone. 

I'm not sorry that I met you. I'll never be sorry that I love you.

Tu Bella. 

I folded the paper into thirds, and then sealed it into the envelope.

When I walked back out to the living room, they were ready.

I sat alone this time in the back of the car. Jasper kept shooting glances at me in the mirror when he thought I wouldn't notice. He kept me calm, which I appreciated.

Archie leaned against the passenger door, his face pointed at Jasper, but I knew he was watching me in his peripheral vision. 

"Archie?" I asked.

He was wary. "Yes? Do you want to back out?"

"No. I wrote a note for Edythe. In case the odds turn on me," I said slowly. "Would you give it to her?"

"Of course, Bella." His voice was careful—the way you spoke to someone standing on a ledge. They could both see me coming apart. I had to control myself better.

We got to the airport quickly. Jasper parked in the center of the garage's fourth floor; the sun couldn't reach this deep into the concrete block. We never had to leave the shadows as we made our way to the terminal. It was terminal four, the biggest one, the most confusing. 

I led the way, for once more knowledgeable about our surroundings than they were. We took the elevator down to level three, where the passengers unloaded. Archie and Jasper spent a while looking at the departing flights board. I could hear them discussing the pros and cons of New York, Atlanta, Chicago. Places I'd never been. Places that might not be in my future anymore.

I went over the plan in my head. It had to be perfect, I had to do everything Archie said I needed to do in order to get the right version of events. One misplacement, and we would be in trouble. I could be in trouble. We sat in the long row of chairs by the metal detectors, and my knee kept bouncing. Jasper and Archie pretended to people-watch, but they were really just watching me. Every inch I shifted in my seat was followed by a quick glance out of the corner of their eyes. They were worried about me.

And then, when I had only thirty-five minutes to make my escape, the numbers changed. Her plane was ten minutes early. I had no more time. I threw a startled look at Archie, he nodded. This was it.

I pulled the unmarked envelope out of my pocket and handed it to Archie.

"You'll get this to her?"

He nodded, standing up and taking the letter and slipping it into his backpack, "Go,"

I hugged him tightly as Jasper stood up. He leaned his head up and kissed Archie, before following my lead. 

Jasper walked silently beside me, his hand on the small of my back, as if he were guiding me. I looked around, looking for my escape route. 

When I found it, I turned to Jasper.

"This is it," I said, nodding to the door. 

"We'll be right behind you," he promised.

I nodded, hesitating a little before I threw my arms around him too, "Thank you," I whispered before turning away.

As soon as I was around the corner of the door less entry, out of sight, I was running.

I laughed when I realized that I remembered this room. My stride lengthened.

I'd been here before. Gotten lost here once, because the other exit was straight through, coming out in a totally different hallway. I knew I was right on track.

I was already in the hall now, sprinting to the elevators. People stared, some looked more shocked than others. I had the urge to stop, I didn't want people to think I was up to no good. Or for airport security to tackle me down. But I had to keep going. No hesitation. 

I dashed up to the elevators, throwing my hand between the closing doors of a full car headed down. I squeezed in beside the irritated passengers and checked to make sure that the button for level one had been pushed. It was already lit, and the doors closed.

As soon as the doors opened, I was off again, to the sound of annoyed murmurs behind me. I slowed myself as I passed the security guards by the luggage carousels, only to break into a stumbling run again as the exit doors came into view. I threw myself at the automatic doors, nearly smacking into the glass when they opened too slowly.

Along the crowded curb there wasn't a cab in sight.

I had no time. 

A boxy white shuttle was just closing its doors a few feet behind me.

"Wait!" I yelled, running, waving at the driver.

"This is the shuttle to the Hyatt," the driver said in confusion as he opened the doors.

"Yeah," I huffed, "that's where I'm going." I jumped up the steps.

He raised an eyebrow at my lack of luggage, but then shrugged, not caring enough to ask.

Most of the seats were empty. I sat as far from the other travelers as possible, and watched out the window as first the sidewalk, and then the airport, got smaller and smaller behind me. I couldn't stop imagining Edythe, where she would stand at the edge of the road when she found the end of my trail.

Don't lose it yet, I told myself. You still have a long way to go.

My luck held. In front of the Hyatt, a tired-looking couple was getting their last suitcase out of the trunk of a cab. I jumped out of the shuttle and ran to the cab, sliding into the seat behind the driver. The tired couple and the shuttle driver stared at me.

I told the surprised cabbie my address. "I need to get there as soon as possible."

"That's in Scottsdale," she complained.

I threw four twenties over the seat.

"Will that be enough?"

"Sure, kid, no problem."

I sat back against the seat, folding my arms across my chest. My city began to rush around me, but I didn't look out the windows. I had to fight to maintain control. There was no point in breaking down now, it wouldn't help anything. My path was set. I just had to follow it. and hope for the right outcome.

So, instead of panicking, I closed my eyes and spent the twenty-minute drive thinking about Edythe.

I imagined that I had stayed at the airport to meet her. I visualized how I would have stood right at the do-not-cross line, the first person she would see as she came down the long hallway from the gates. She would move too fast through the other passengers—and they would stare because she was so graceful. She would dart across those last few feet—not quite human—and then she'd throw her arms around me. And I wouldn't bother with careful.

I wondered where we would have gone. North somewhere, so she could be outside in the day. Or maybe somewhere very remote, so we could lie in the sun together again. I imagined her by the shore, her skin sparkling like the sea. It wouldn't matter how long we had to hide. To be trapped in a hotel room with her would be like heaven. So many things I still wanted to know about her. I could listen to her talk forever, never sleeping, never leaving her side.

I could see her face so clearly now... almost hear her voice. And, despite everything, for a second I was actually happy. I was so involved in my escapist daydream, I lost all track of the racing seconds.

"Hey, what was the number?"

The cabbie's question punctured my fantasy. The fear I'd controlled for a few minutes took control again. 

I'd realized we had stopped, I hoped I didn't waste precious seconds. 

"Fifty-eight twenty-one." My voice sounded strangled. The cabbie looked at me like she was nervous that I was having an episode or something.

"Here we are, then." She was anxious to get me out of her car, probably hoping I wouldn't ask for my change.

"Thank you," I whispered. There was no need to be afraid, I reminded myself. I knew the house was empty. 

I ran to the door, reaching up automatically to grab the key under the eave. It was dark inside, empty, normal. The smell was so familiar, it almost incapacitated me. It felt like my mother must be close, just in the other room, but I knew that wasn't true. She was safe. 

I ran to the phone, turning on the kitchen light on my way. There, on the whiteboard, was a ten-digit number written in a small, neat hand. My fingers stumbled over the keypad, making mistakes. I had to hang up and start again. I concentrated on just the buttons this time, carefully pressing each one in turn. I was successful. I held the phone to my ear with a shaking hand. It rang only once.

"Hello, Bella," that deep voice answered. "That was very quick. I'm impressed."

"Is my mom okay?"

"She's perfectly fine. Don't worry, Bella, I have no quarrel with her. Unless you didn't come alone, of course." Light, amused. 

"I'm alone." I'd never been more alone in my entire life.

"Very good. Now, do you know the ballet studio just around the corner from your home?"

"Yeah. I know how to get there."

"Well, then, I'll see you very soon."

I hung up.

I ran from the room, through the door, out into the morning heat.

From the corner of my eye, I could almost see my mother standing in the shade of the big eucalyptus tree where I'd played as a kid. Or kneeling by the little plot of dirt around the mailbox, the cemetery of all the flowers she'd tried to grow. The memories were better than any reality I would see today. But I raced away from them. She was safe. In Florida.

I felt so slow, like I was running through wet sand—I couldn't seem to get enough purchase from the concrete. I tripped over my feet several times, once falling, catching myself with my hands, scraping them on the sidewalk, and then lurching up to plunge forward again. At last I made it to the corner. Just another street now; I ran, sweat pouring down my face, gasping. The sun was hot on my skin, too bright as it bounced off the white concrete and blinded me.

When I rounded the last corner, onto Cactus, I could see the studio, looking just as I remembered it. The parking lot in front was empty, the vertical blinds in all the windows drawn. I couldn't run anymore—I couldn't breathe; my lungs were on fire. 

As I got closer, I could see the sign taped inside the door. It was handwritten on bright pink paper; it said the dance studio was closed for spring break. I touched the handle, tugged on it cautiously. It was unlocked. I fought to catch my breath and opened the door.

The lobby was dark and empty, cool, the air conditioner thrumming. The plastic molded chairs were stacked along the walls, and the carpet was damp. The west dance floor was dark, I could see through the open viewing window. The east dance floor, the bigger room, the one from Archie's vision, was lit. But the blinds were closed on the window.

Terror seized me so strongly that I was literally trapped by it. I couldn't make my feet move forward.

And then my mom's voice called for me.

"Bella? Bella?" That same tone of hysterical panic. I sprinted to the door, panicking, forgetting that my mom was safe as I ran to the sound of her voice.

"Bella, you scared me! Don't you ever do that to me again!" Her voice continued as I ran into the long, high-ceilinged room.

I stared around me, trying to find where her voice was coming from. I heard her laugh, and I spun toward the sound.

There she was, on the TV screen, mussing my hair in relief. It was Thanksgiving, and I was twelve. We'd gone to see my grandmother in California, the last year before she died. We went to the beach one day, and I'd leaned too far over the edge of the pier. Mom had seen my feet flailing, trying to reclaim my balance. "Bella? Bella?" she'd cried out in panic.

And then the TV screen was blue.

I turned slowly. The tracker was standing very still by the back exit, so still I hadn't noticed him at first. In his hand was a remote control. We stared at each other for a long moment, and then he smiled.

He walked toward me, got just a few feet away, and then passed me to put the remote down next to the VCR. I pivoted carefully to watch him.

"Sorry about that, Bella, but isn't it better that your mother didn't really have to be involved in all this?" His voice was kind.

I laughed. I already knew that.

"You don't sound angry that I tricked you."

"Because you didn't." My sudden high made me brave. What did it matter now? It would be over soon. Mom and dad would never be hurt, would never have to be afraid. The Cullens would arrive any second, and this will all be over with. Whether I survived. Dead, alive, or immortal.

"How odd that you still came, even knowing it was a ruse." His dark eyes looked me up and down. The irises were nearly black, just a hint of ruby around the edges. Thirsty. "I will give your strange coven this much; you humans can be quite interesting. I guess I can see the draw of observing you more closely. It's amazing—some of you seem to have no sense of your own self-interest at all."

He was standing a few feet away from me, arms folded, looking at me curiously. There was no menace in his expression or stance. He was so average-looking, nothing remarkable about his face or body at all. Just the white skin, the circled eyes I was used to. He wore a pale blue, long-sleeved shirt and faded blue jeans.

I waited silently.

"Would you mind, very much, if I left a little gift for Edythe?"

He took a step back and touched a palm-sized digital video camera balanced carefully on top of the stereo. A small red light indicated that it was already running. He adjusted it a few times, widened the frame.

"I don't think she'll be able to resist hunting me after she watches this."

I stared into the camera lens.

"You're really cocky aren't you? Playing with your food while seven vampires are out looking for me right now. Are you sure you have much time?"

"I could be wrong about her level of interest," James went on, ignoring me. "Obviously, you're not important enough for her to decide to keep you. So... I'll have to make this really offensive, won't I?" he smiled at me, then turned to smile at the camera.

He stepped toward me, still smiling. "Before we begin..."

I'd known there was a possibility that I was going to die. I'd thought I was prepared for that. Even if the chances were in my favor. I had faith in the Cullens—in Edythe. But I still had to consider another version—that he would kill me, drink my blood, and that would be the end.

There was a different version after all.

I felt numb, frozen.

"I'm going to tell you a story, Bella. Once, a long time ago, my prey escaped me. Shocking, I know! It only happened the one time, so you can imagine how it's haunted me. It was a similar situation in many ways. There was a delicious human boy—he smelled even better than you do, no offense—but only one vampire protected him. It should have been a very easy meal. However, I underestimated the boy's protector. When she knew I was after her little friend, she stole him from the asylum where she worked—can you imagine the degradation? Actually working a human job for your food?" he shook his head in disbelief. "As I was saying, she took him from the asylum, and once she freed him, she made him safe. He was important enough to her, but then, he was special. A hundred years earlier he would have been burned at the stake for his visions. In the nineteen-twenties it was the asylum and the shock treatments. Poor boy—he didn't even seem to notice the pain of his transformation. When he opened his eyes, it was like he'd never seen the sun before. The old vampire made him a strong new vampire, and there was no reason for me to touch him then, no blood to enjoy." he sighed. "I destroyed the old one in vengeance."

"Archie!" I breathed. 

"Yes, your friend. I was so surprised to see him in the clearing. This is why I've told you my story—to bring them comfort. I get you, but they get him. My one lost quarry—quite an honor, actually.

"I still regret that I never got to taste..."

He took another step toward me. Now he was just inches away. He leaned his face in closer to me, his nose skimming up the side of my throat. The touch of his cold skin made me want to recoil, but I couldn't move.

"I suppose you'll do," he whispered in my ear.

I was still numb. The only thing I was starting to be able to feel was my stomach, rolling with nausea. I stared into the camera, and it was like Edythe was already watching. They were supposed to be here by now.

The tracker stepped back and began to circle me casually, like he was trying to get a better view of a statue in a museum. His face was still friendly as he decided where to start. And then his smile got wider and wider and wider till his mouth was just a gash full of teeth. He slumped forward into a crouch. 

I didn't see what part of her hit me—it was too fast. He just blurred, there was a loud snap, and my right arm was suddenly hanging like it wasn't connected to my elbow anymore. My head banged against the concrete wall before I fell to the wooden floors. The very last thing was the pain—it lanced up my arm a long second later.

The hunter was watching again now, but his face hadn't gone back to normal, it was still mostly teeth. He waited for the pain to hit me, watched as I gasped and curled in around my broken arm

My eyes couldn't focus on his face.

My eyes closed. I forced them open.

"Oh, I'm sorry about that," He laughed darkly, nodding to my broken arm. 

I watched as he gently lifted my good arm and held my hand to his lips. The next pain was hardly even pain, compared to the rest. He could have easily taken off my finger, but he just nipped it. His teeth didn't even go that deep.

I barely reacted, but he jumped up and spun away. My head thumped against the ground. I watched him, strangely detached as he paced the far end of the room, snarling and shaking his head back and forth. He'd left the camera by my head, still running.

The first hint of what he'd done was the heat—my finger was so hot. I was surprised I could even feel that over the bigger agonies. But I remembered Carine's story. I knew what had started. I was too late.

He was still trying to calm himself—the blood, that was the problem. He'd gotten some of my blood in his mouth, but he didn't want to kill me yet, so he had to fight off the frenzy. He was distracted, but it wouldn't take much to catch his attention.

Fire had ignited my bitten finger—flames exploded across my palm. Heat was scorching up my wrist. It was fire that was more than fire—a pain that was more than pain.

The other agonies were nothing. Broken bones weren't pain. Not like this.

The screaming sounded like it was coming from someplace outside my body—it was an unbroken yowling that was like an animal again.

My eyes were fixed, staring, and I saw the red light flashing in the tracker's hand. He was back.

But I didn't care anymore.

The tracker's nostrils were flared, his eyes wild, his teeth bared. Here was my last shred of hope. He wouldn't be able to stop himself now. He would have to kill me. 

His mouth opened wide.

I closed my eyes and I drifted.

As I drifted, I heard the call of an Angel.


	23. The Angel

I was dreaming.

Where I floated, under the dark water, I heard the happiest sound my mind could conjure up – as beautiful, as uplifting, as it was ghastly. It was another snarl; a deeper, wilder roar that rang with fury.

I was brought back, almost to the surface, by a sharp pain slashing my upraised hand, but I couldn't find my way back far enough to open my eyes.

And then I knew I was dead.

Because, through the heavy water, I heard the sound of an angel calling my name, calling me to the only heaven I wanted.

"Oh no, Bella, no!" the angel's voice cried in horror.

Behind that longed-for sound was another noise – an awful tumult that my mind shied away from. A vicious bass growling, a shocking snapping sound, and a high keening, suddenly breaking off. . .

I tried to concentrate on the angel's voice instead.

"Bella, please! Bella, listen to me, please, please, Bella, please!" She begged.

Yes, I wanted to say. Anything. But I couldn't find my lips.

"Carine!" the angel called, agony in her perfect voice. "Bella, Bella, no, oh please, no, no!" And the angel was sobbing tearless, broken sobs.

The angel shouldn't weep, it was wrong. I tried to find her, to tell her everything was fine, but the water was so deep, it was pressing on me, and I couldn't breathe.

There was a point of pressure against my head. It hurt. Then, as that pain broke through the darkness to me, other pains came, stronger pains. I cried out, gasping, breaking through the dark pool.

"Bella!" the angel cried.

"She's lost some blood, but the head wound isn't deep," a calm voice informed me. "Watch out for her arm, it's broken. "

A howl of rage strangled on the angel's lips.

I felt a sharp stab in my side. This couldn't be heaven, could it? There was too much pain for that.

"Some ribs, too, I think," the methodical voice continued.

But the sharp pains were fading. There was a new pain, a scalding pain in my hand that was overshadowing everything else.

Someone was burning me.

"Edythe. " I tried to tell her, but my voice was so heavy and slow. I couldn't understand myself.

"Bella, you're going to be fine. Can you hear me, Bella? I love you. "

"Edythe," I tried again. My voice was a little clearer.

"Yes, I'm here. "

"It hurts," I whimpered.

"I know, Bella, I know" – and then, away from me, anguished – "can't you do anything?"

"My bag, please. . . Hold your breath, Archie, it will help," Carine promised.

"Archie?" I groaned.

"He's here, I haven't killed him yet. "

"My hand hurts," I tried to tell her.

"I know, Bella. Carine will give you something, it will stop. "

"My hand is burning!" I screamed, finally breaking through the last of the darkness, my eyes fluttering open. I couldn't see her face, something dark and warm was clouding my eyes. Why couldn't they see the fire and put it out?

Her voice was frightened. "Bella?"

"No—hand," I gasped out. "Edythe—right hand!"

I couldn't feel her cold hands on my skin—the fire was too hot. But I heard her gasp.

"No!"

"Edythe?" Carine asked, startled.

"He bit her." Edythe's voice had no volume, like she'd run out of air, too.

Carine caught her breath in horror.

"What do I do, Carine?" Edythe demanded.

No one answered her. The tugging continued on my scalp, but it didn't hurt.

"Yes," Edythe said through her teeth. "I can try. Archie—scalpel."

"There's a good chance you'll kill her yourself," Archie said.

"Give it to me," she snapped. "I can do this."

I didn't see what she did with the scalpel. I couldn't feel anything else in my body anymore—nothing but the fire in my arm. But I watched her raise my hand to her mouth, like the hunter had. Fresh blood was welling from the wound. She put her lips over it.

At first the pain was worse. I screamed and thrashed against the cool hands that held me back. I heard Archie's voice, trying to calm me. Something heavy held my leg to the floor, and Carine had my head locked in the vise of her stone arms.

Then, slowly, my writhing calmed as my hand grew more and more numb. The fire was dulling, focusing into an ever-smaller point.

I felt my consciousness slipping as the pain subsided. I was afraid to fall into the black waters again, afraid I would lose him in the darkness.

"Edythe," I tried to say, but I couldn't hear my voice. They could hear me.

"She's right here, Bella. "

"Stay, Edythe, stay with me. . . "

"I will. " Her voice was strained, but somehow triumphant.

I sighed contentedly. The fire was gone, the other pains dulled by a sleepiness seeping through my body.

"Is it all out?" Carine asked from somewhere far away.

"Her blood tastes clean," Edythe said quietly. "I can taste the morphine. "

"Bella?" Carine called to me.

I tried to answer. "Mmmmm?"

"Is the fire gone?"

"Yes," I sighed. "Thank you, Edythe. "

"I love you," she answered.

"I know," I breathed, so tired.

I heard my favorite sound in the world: Edythe's quiet laugh, weak with relief.

I also heard another sound; Archie's deeper chuckle. 

That reminded me. 

"Archie. " I tried to open my eyes. "Archie, the video – he knew you, Archie, he knew where you came from. " I meant to speak urgently, but my voice was feeble. "I smell gasoline," I added, surprised through the haze in my brain.

"It's time to move her," Carine said.

"No, I want to sleep," I complained.

"You can sleep, my love, I'll carry you," Edythe soothed me.

And I was in her arms, cradled against her chest – floating, all the pain gone.

"Sleep now, Bella" were the last words I heard.


	24. An Impasse

My eyes opened to a bright, white light. I was in an unfamiliar room, a white room. The wall beside me was covered in long vertical blinds; over my head, the glaring lights blinded me. I was propped up on a hard, uneven bed – a bed with rails. The pillows were flat and lumpy. There was an annoying beeping sound somewhere close by. I hoped that meant I was still alive. Death shouldn't be this uncomfortable.

My hands were all twisted up with clear tubes, and something was taped across my face, under my nose. I lifted my hand to rip it off.

"No, you don't. " And cool fingers caught my hand.

"Edythe?" I turned my head slightly, and her exquisite face was just inches from mine, her chin resting on the edge of my pillow. I realized again that I was alive, this time with gratitude and elation. "Oh, Edythe!"

"Shhhh," she shushed me. "Everything's all right now. "

"What happened?" I couldn't remember clearly, and my mind rebelled against me as I tried to recall.

"I was almost too late. I could have been too late," she whispered, her voice tormented. "And you knew that but you still went."

"I had to end it. I didn't want him coming after me anymore. He could've gotten to my mom or my dad. "

"I know, love. I understand why you did it. "

"I need to call my dad and my mom," I realized through the haze.

"Archie called them. Amelia is here – well, here in the hospital. She's getting something to eat right now. "

"She's here?" I tried to sit up, but the spinning in my head accelerated, and her hand pushed me gently down onto the pillows.

"She'll be back soon," she promised. "And you need to stay still. "

"But what did you tell her?" I panicked. I had no interest in being soothed. My mom was here and I was recovering from a vampire attack. "Why did you tell her I'm here?"

"You fell down a flight of stairs and through a window. " She paused. "You have to admit, it could happen. "

I sighed, and it hurt. I stared down at my body under the sheet, my arm looked heavy under its cast.

"How bad am I?" I asked.

"You have arm leg, two broken ribs, some cracks in your skull, bruises covering every inch of your skin, and you've lost a lot of blood, though that was mostly my fault. They gave you a few transfusions. I didn't like it – it made you smell all wrong for a while. "

"That must have been a nice change for you. "

"No, I like how you smell. "

"How did you do it?" I asked quietly. She knew what I meant at once.

"I'm not sure. " She looked away from my wondering eyes, lifting my gauze-wrapped hand from the bed and holding it gently in hers, careful not to disrupt the wire connecting me to one of the monitors.

I waited patiently for the rest.

She sighed without returning my gaze. "It was impossible. . . to stop," she whispered. "Impossible. But I did. " She looked up finally, with half a smile. "I must love you. "

"Don't I taste as good as I smell?" I smiled in response. 

"Even better – better than I'd imagined. "

"I love that I lived up to your imagination," I laughed softly, wincing when I felt pain. 

She raised her eyes to the ceiling. "You, Archie and Jasper owe me an apology. "

"What for?"

"For very nearly taking yourself away from me forever. "

"I'm sorry," I apologized.

"I know why you did it. " Her voice was comforting. "It was still irrational, of course. You should have waited for me, you should have told me. "

"You wouldn't have let me go. "

"No," she agreed in a grim tone, "I wouldn't. "

Some very unpleasant memories were beginning to come back to me. I shuddered, and then winced.

She was instantly anxious. "Bella, what's wrong?"

"What happened to James?"

"After I pulled him off you, Emmett and Jasper took care of him. " There was a fierce note of regret in her voice.

This confused me. "I didn't see Emmett and Jasper there. "

"They had to leave the room. . . there was some blood. "

"But you stayed. "

"Yes, I stayed. "

"And Archie, and Carine. . . " I said in wonder.

"They love you, too, you know. "

A flash of painful images from the last time I'd seen Archie reminded me of something. "Did Archie see the tape?" I asked anxiously.

"Yes. " A new sound darkened her voice, a tone of sheer hatred.

"He was always in the dark, that's why he didn't remember. "

"I know. He understands now. " Her voice was even, but her face was black with fury.

I tried to reach her face with my free hand, but something stopped me. I glanced down to see the IV pulling at my hand.

"Ugh. " I winced.

"What is it?" she asked anxiously – distracted, but not enough. The bleakness did not entirely leave her eyes.

"Needles," I explained, looking away from the one in my hand. I concentrated on a warped ceiling tile and tried to breathe deeply despite the ache in my ribs.

"Afraid of a needle," she muttered to herself under her breath, shaking her head. "Oh, a sadistic vampire, intent on torturing her to death, sure, no problem, she runs off to meet him. An IV, on the other hand. . . "

I rolled my eyes. I was pleased to discover that this reaction, at least, was pain-free. I decided to change the subject.

"Why are you here?" I asked.

She stared at me, first confusion and then hurt touching her eyes. Her brows pulled together as she frowned. "Do you want me to leave?"

"No!" I protested, horrified by the thought. "No, I meant, why does my mom think you're here? I need to have my story straight before she gets back. "

"Oh," she said, and her forehead smoothed back into marble. "I came to Phoenix to talk some sense into you, to convince you to come back to Forks. " Her wide eyes were so earnest and sincere, I almost believed her myself. "You agreed to see me, and you drove out to the hotel where I was staying with Carine and Archie – of course I was here with parental supervision," she inserted virtuously, "but you tripped on the stairs on the way to my room and. . . well, you know the rest. You don't need to remember any details, though; you have a good excuse to be a little muddled about the finer points. "

I thought about it for a moment. "There are a few flaws with that story. Like no broken windows. "

"Not really," she said. "Archie had a little bit too much fun fabricating evidence. It's all been taken care of very convincingly – you could probably sue the hotel if you wanted to. You have nothing to worry about," she promised, stroking my cheek with the lightest of touches. "Your only job now is to heal. "

I wasn't so lost to the soreness or the fog of medication that I didn't respond to her touch. The beeping of the monitor jumped around erratically – now she wasn't the only one who could hear my heart misbehave.

"That's going to be embarrassing," I muttered to myself.

She chuckled, and a speculative look came into her eye. "Hmm, I wonder. . . "

She leaned in slowly; the beeping noise accelerated wildly before her lips even touched me. But when they did, though with the gentlest of pressure, the beeping stopped altogether.

She pulled back abruptly, her anxious expression turning to relief as the monitor reported the restarting of my heart.

"It seems that I'm going to have to be even more careful with you than usual. " She frowned.

"I was not finished kissing you," I complained. "Don't make me come over there. "

She grinned, dimples flashed and bent to press her lips lightly to mine. The monitor went wild.

But then her lips were taut. She pulled away.

"I think I hear your mother," she said, grinning again.

"Don't leave me," I groaned. I was away from her for way too long. 

She chuckled at my whining. "I won't," she promised solemnly, and then she smiled. "I'll take a nap. "

She moved from the hard plastic chair by my side to the turquoise faux-leather recliner at the foot of my bed, leaning it all the way back, and closing her eyes. She was perfectly still.

"Don't forget to breathe," I whispered sarcastically. She took a deep breath, her still closed.

I could hear my mom now. She was talking to someone, maybe a nurse, and she sounded tired and upset. I wanted to jump out of the bed and run to her, to calm her, promise that everything was fine. But I wasn't in any sort of shape for jumping, so I waited impatiently.

The door opened a crack, and she peeked through.

"Mami!" I whispered, my voice full of love and relief.

She took in Edythe's still form on the recliner and tiptoed to my bedside.

"She never leaves, does she?" she mumbled to herself.

"Mami, I missed you!"

She bent down to hug me gently, and I felt warm tears falling on my cheeks.

"Bella, pendeja! How the fuck do you manage to get yourself in these situations! I was so worried!"

"I'm sorry, ma. But everything's fine now, it's okay," I comforted her.

"I'm just glad to finally see your eyes open. " She sat on the edge of my bed.

I suddenly realized I didn't have any idea when it was. "How long have they been closed?"

"It's Friday, hon, you've been out for a while. "

"Friday?" I was shocked. I tried to remember what day it had been when. . . but I didn't want to think about that.

"They had to keep you sedated for a while, honey – you've got a lot of injuries. "

"I know. " I could feel them.

"You're lucky Dr. Cullen was there. She's such a nice woman. . . very young, though. And she looks more like a model than a doctor. . . "

"You met Carine?"

"And Edythe's brother Archie. He's a lovely boy. "

"He is," I agreed wholeheartedly.

She glanced over her shoulder at Edythe, lying with her eyes closed in the chair. "You didn't tell me you had such good friends in Forks. "

I cringed, and then moaned.

"What hurts?" she demanded anxiously, turning back to me. Edythe's eyes flashed to my face.

"It's fine," I assured them. "I just have to remember not to move. " she lapsed back into her phony slumber.

I took advantage of my mother's momentary distraction to keep the subject from returning to my less-than-candid behavior. "Where's Phil?" I asked quickly.

"Florida – oh, Bella! You'll never guess! Ya cuando nos íbamos, la mejor noticias!"

"Phil got signed?" I guessed.

"Yes! How did you guess! The Suns, can you believe it?"

"That's great, mami," I said as enthusiastically as I could manage, though I had little idea what that meant.

"And you'll like Jacksonville so much," she gushed while I stared at her vacantly. "I was a little bit worried when Phil started talking about Akron, what with the snow and everything, because you know how I hate the cold, but now Jacksonville! It's always sunny, and the humidity really isn't that bad. We found the cutest house, yellow, with white trim, and a porch just like in an old movie, and this huge oak tree, and it's just a few minutes from the ocean, and you'll have your own bathroom -"

"Wait, ma!" I interrupted. Edythe still had her eyes closed, but she looked too tense to pass as asleep. "What are you talking about? I'm not going to Florida. I live in Forks. "

"But you don't have to anymore, corazoncito," she laughed. "Phil will be able to be around so much more now. . . we've talked about it a lot, and what I'm going to do is trade off on the away games, half the time with you, half the time with him. "

"Mami. " I hesitated, wondering how best to be diplomatic about this. "I want to live in Forks. I'm already settled in at school, and I have a couple of first" – she glanced toward Edythe again when I reminded her of friends, so I tried another direction – "and dad needs me. He's just all alone up there, and he can't cook at all. "

"You want to stay in Forks?" she asked, bewildered. The idea was inconceivable to her. And then her eyes flickered back toward Edythe. "Why?"

"I told you – school, dad – ouch!" I'd shrugged. Not a good idea.

Her hands fluttered helplessly over me, trying to find a safe place to pat. She made do with my forehead.

"Bella, amor, you hate Forks," she reminded me.

"It's not so bad. "

She frowned and looked back and forth between Edythe and me, this time very deliberately.

"Is it this girl?" she whispered.

I opened my mouth to lie, but her eyes were scrutinizing my face, and I knew she would see through that.

"She's part of it," I admitted. No need to confess how big a part. "So, have you had a chance to talk with Edythe?" I asked.

"Yes. " She hesitated, looking at her perfectly still form. "And I want to talk to you about that. "

Uh-oh. "What about?" I asked.

"I think that girl is in love with you," she accused, keeping her voice low.

"I think so, too," I confided.

"And how do you feel about her?" She only poorly concealed the raging curiosity in her voice.

I sighed, looking away. As much as I loved my mom, this was not a conversation I wanted to have with her. "I'm pretty crazy about her. " There – that sounded like something a teenager with her first girlfriend might say.

"Well, she seems very nice, and, my goodness, she's incredibly good-looking, but you're so young, Bella. . . " Her voice was unsure; as far as I could remember, this was the first time since I was eight that she'd come close to trying to sound like a parental authority. I recognized the reasonable-but-firm tone of voice from talks I'd had with her about girls.

"I know that, Mom. Don't worry about it. It's just a crush," I soothed her.

"That's right," she agreed, easily pleased.

Then she sighed and glanced guiltily over her shoulder at the big, round clock on the wall.

"Do you need to go?"

She bit her lip. "Phil's supposed to call in a little while. . . I didn't know you were going to wake up. . . "

"No problem, ma. " I tried to tone down the relief so she wouldn't get her feelings hurt. "I won't be alone. "

"I'll be back soon. I've been sleeping here, you know," she announced, proud of herself.

"Oh, ma, you don't have to do that! You can sleep at home – I'll never notice. " The swirl of painkillers in my brain was making it hard to concentrate even now, though, apparently, I'd been sleeping for days.

"I was too nervous," she admitted sheepishly. "There's been some crime in the neighborhood, and I don't like being there alone. "

"Crime?" I asked in alarm.

"Someone broke into that dance studio around the corner from the house and burned it to the ground – there's nothing left at all! And they left a stolen car right out front. Do you remember when I used to work there?"

"I remember. " I shivered, and winced.

"I can stay, cariño, if you need me. "

"No, ma, I'll be fine. Edythe will be with me. "

She looked like that might be why she wanted to stay. "I'll be back tonight. " It sounded as much like a warning as it sounded like a promise, and she glanced at Edythe again as she said it.

"I love you, mami. "

"I love you, too, Bella. Try to be more careful when you walk, I don't want to lose you. "

Edythe's eyes stayed closed, but a wide grin flashed across her face.

A nurse came bustling in then to check all my tubes and wires. My mom kissed my forehead, patted my gauze-wrapped hand, and left.

The nurse was checking the paper readout on my heart monitor.

"Are you feeling anxious, honey? Your heart rate got a little high there. "

"I'm fine," I assured her.

"I'll tell your RN that you're awake. She'll be in to see you in a minute. "

As soon as she closed the door, Edythe was at my side.

"You stole a car?" I raised my eyebrows.

She smiled, unrepentant. "It was a good car, very fast. "

"How was your nap?" I asked.

"Interesting. " Her eyes narrowed.

"What?"

She looked down while she answered. "I'm surprised. I thought Florida. . . and your mother. . . well, I thought that's what you would want. "

"You're what I want," I said like is was the most obvious thing in the world. Because it was. "Am I not what you want?"

"No, I don't want to be without you, Bella, of course not. Be rational. And I have no problem with saving you, either – if it weren't for the fact that I was the one putting you in danger. . . that I'm the reason that you're here. "

"Yes, you are the reason. " I frowned. "The reason I'm here – alive. "

"Barely. " Her voice was just a whisper. "Covered in gauze and plaster and hardly able to move. "

"I wasn't referring to my most recent near-death experience," I said, growing irritated. "I was thinking of the others – you can take your pick. If it weren't for you, I would be rotting away in the Forks cemetery. "

She winced at my words, but the haunted look didn't leave her eyes.

"That's not the worst part, though," she continued to whisper. She acted as if I hadn't spoken. "Not seeing you there on the floor. . . crumpled and broken. " Her voice was choked. "Not thinking I was too late. Not even hearing you scream in pain – all those unbearable memories that I'll carry with me for the rest of eternity. No, the very worst was feeling. . . knowing that I couldn't stop. Believing that I was going to kill you myself. "

"But you didn't. "

"I could have. So easily. "

"Promise me," I whispered.

"What?"

"You know what. " I was starting to get angry now. She was so stubbornly determined to dwell on the negative.

She heard the change in my tone. Her eyes tightened. "I don't seem to be strong enough to stay away from you, so I suppose that you'll get your way. . . whether it kills you or not," she added roughly.

"Good. " she hadn't promised, though – a fact that I had not missed. "You told me how you stopped. . . now I want to know why," I demanded.

"Why?" she repeated warily.

"Why you did it. Why didn't you just let the venom spread? By now I would be just like you. "

Edythe's eyes seemed to turn flat black, and I remembered that this was something she'd never intended me to know. Archie must have been preoccupied by the things he'd learned about himself. . . or he'd been very careful with his thoughts around her – clearly, she'd had no idea that he'd filled me in on the mechanics of vampire conversions. She was surprised, and infuriated. Her nostrils flared, her mouth looked as if it was chiseled from stone.

She wasn't going to answer, that much was clear.

"I'll be the first to admit that I have no experience with relationships," I said. "But it just seems logical. . . a woman and woman in a relationship have to be equal. . . as in, one of them can't always be swooping in and saving the other one. They have to save each other equally. "

She folded her arms on the side of my bed and rested her chin on her arms. Her expression was smooth, the anger reined in. Evidently, she'd decided she wasn't angry with me. I hoped I'd get a chance to warn Archie before she caught up with him.

"You have saved me," she said quietly.

"I can't always be Lois Lane," I insisted. "I want to be Superman, too. "

"You don't know what you're asking. " Her voice was soft; she stared intently at the edge of the pillowcase.

"I think I do. "

"Bella, you don't know. I've had almost ninety years to think about this, and I'm still not sure. "

"Do you wish that Carine hadn't saved you?"

"No, I don't wish that. " She paused before continuing. "But my life was over. I wasn't giving anything up. "

"You are my life. You're the only thing it would hurt me to lose. " I was getting better at this. It was easy to admit how much I needed her.

She was very calm, though. Decided.

"I can't do it, Bella. I won't do that to you. "

"It's not something we need to discuss now, but in the near future I may have to make that decision. For now, this is enough," I said, grabbing her arm. 

"Good," 

"Archie already saw it, didn't he?" I remembered. "That's why the things he says upset you. He knows I'm going to be like you. . . someday. "

"He's wrong. She also saw you dead, but that didn't happen, either. "

"You'll never catch me betting against Archie. "

We stared at each other for a very long time. It was quiet except for the whirring of the machines, the beeping, the dripping, the ticking of the big clock on the wall. Finally, her expression softened.

"So, where does that leave us?" I wondered.

She chuckled humorlessly. "I believe it's called an impasse. "

I sighed. "Ouch," I muttered.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, eyeing the button for the nurse.

"I'm fine," I lied.

"I don't believe you," she said gently.

"I'm not going back to sleep. "

"You need rest."

She reached for the button.

"No!"

She ignored me.

"Yes?" the speaker on the wall squawked.

"I think we're ready for more pain medication," she said calmly, ignoring my annoyed expression.

"I'll send in the nurse. " The voice sounded very bored.

"Ass." I huffed.

She looked offended for a moment, before finally bursting into laughter, "You're so cute,"

Then she smiled her dimpled smile, and took my face between her hands and gently pressed her lips to mine. "I'll be here as long as you want me,"

I smiled back. "You're talking about forever, you know. "

"Oh, you'll get over it – it's just a crush. "

I shook my head in disbelief- it made me dizzy. "I was shocked when ma swallowed that one. I know you know better. "

"That's the beautiful thing about being human," she told me. "Things change. "

My eyes narrowed. "Don't hold your breath. "

She was laughing when the nurse came in, brandishing a syringe.

"Excuse me," she said brusquely to Edythe.

She got up and crossed to the end of the small room, leaning against the wall. She folded her arms and waited. I kept my eyes on her, still smiling. She met my gaze and winked.

"Here you go, honey. " The nurse smiled as she injected the medicine into my tube. "You'll feel better now. "

"Thanks," I mumbled, unenthusiastic. It didn't take long. I could feel the drowsiness trickling through my bloodstream almost immediately.

"That ought to do it," she muttered as my eyelids drooped.

She must have left the room, because something cold and smooth touched my face.

"Stay. " The word was slurred.

"I will," she promised. Her voice was beautiful, like a lullaby. "Like I said, as long as it makes you happy. . . as long as it's what's best for you. "

I tried to shake my head, but it was too heavy. "'S not the same thing," I mumbled.

She laughed. "Don't worry about that now, Bella. You can argue with me when you wake up. "

I think I smiled. '"Kay. "

I could feel her lips at my ear.

"I love you," she whispered.

"Me, too. "

"I know," she laughed quietly.

I turned my head slightly. . . searching. She knew what I was after. Her lips touched mine gently.

"Thanks," I sighed.

"Anytime. "

I wasn't really there at all anymore. But I fought against the stupor weakly. There was just one more thing I wanted to tell her.

"Edythe?" I struggled to pronounce her name clearly.

"Yes?"

"I'm betting on Archie," I mumbled.

And then the night closed over me.


	25. Epilogue: An Occasion

"I can't believe I actually let a vampire blindfold me," I huffed. 

She laughed, "I can't believe you let a vampire kiss you." 

"It's because I love her," 

"Not more than she loves you," she retorted.

There were a few things in this world that I hated. One of those things included surprises. So, when Archie showed up to my house telling me he had been sent to dress me for a date I had with Edythe that night I was more than surprised. I got over it, until I remembered that prom was today and locked myself in the bathroom and refused to leave until it was over. Edythe finally came and convinced me that that wasn't where we were headed. I believed her and she was promptly kicked out by Archie so he could finish fixing me. 

That's how I ended up in the Porche wearing a red dress and sneakers (because high heels should be nowhere near my feet.) Oh, and a blindfold.

"I think the blindfold is a bit excessive." I complain when the car came to a stop.

"Yeah, it's dramatic but—" her voice disappeared with the sound of her door closing and returned with the sound of mine opening a second later. "—why not?" 

She grabbed my good arm and helped me off the car. 

"I'm going to have to jump on your back, aren't I?" I guessed with a sigh.

She giggled, kissing my nose, "Smart girl. Come on, hop on."

I couldn't stop my smile as I let her guide me into my place on her back, but it dropped off my face as soon as I felt that we were in motion. This time it wasn't so bad, the breeze hitting my face was cool and nice. I knew I was safe with Edythe, so I wasn't scared that she was going to run into any trees anymore. 

She stopped a second later, helping me off her back.

"I swear if we're at prom I'll ki—" my words dropped when the blindfold finally came off my eyes and I was abled to take in the sight in front of me. 

We were at our meadow, but it had been decorated. Lights were strung up from the trees, making a zig zag above the clearing. In the center, sat a table for two. Edythe had stopped right next to it, there were wildflowers in a small vase in the middle and two candles illuminated two covered plates. 

I heard a pop behind me and I turned to Edythe with my mouth hanging open. 

"Wine?" she flashed her dimples, pouring wine into a glass before offering it to me.

"How?"

"My brothers helped, of course, but it was mostly me who did the job. For you?"

"For me?"

She laughed, "Yes, my love, for you,"

My face melted and I looked at her through loved up eyes as I leaned forward to kiss her softly. When I pulled back, I took the glass of red with me.

"What's the occasion?"

The moon was already up, visible through the gauzy clouds, and her face glowed pale in the white light but was warmed again by the yellow lights around us. 

"I would've taken you to prom, but I knew you wouldn't like it. I figured something more private would make you smile," she responded as she pulled the chair for me to sit. 

I sipped on my drink as she moved as human pace to her side of the table. 

"What's for dinner?" I asked, removing the metal cover on my plate and setting it aside. 

"For you it's spaghetti, curtesy of Esme," she explains as my mouth salivated at that food in front of me.

"Oh my god,"

We talked a little as I ate, and as she picked at her own plate of food. She cut me off after my fifth cup of wine and I started sounding silly, and gave me some water. After I finished my food, we moved to a blanket that was set up on the floor. As she turned off the lights, I finally saw the stars. 

"Whoa," I breathed as Edythe joined me.

I laid my head on her chest and she wrapped an extra blanket around me. 

She kissed my head before staring up at the moon.

"Twilight, again," she murmured. "Another ending. No matter how perfect the day is, it always has to end. "

"Some things don't have to end," I muttered through my teeth, instantly tense.

She sighed.

We were quiet for a minute; she stared at the moon and I stared at her. I wished there was some way to explain how very uninterested I was in a normal human life.

"Will you tell me something?" he asked, glancing down at me with a slight smile.

"Don't I always?"

"Just promise you'll tell me," he insisted, grinning.

I knew I was going to regret this almost instantly. "Fine. "

"You asked what the occasion was," she began.

"I did," I interjected.

". . . I'm curious – what did you think I was dressing you up for?"

"Well. . . I assumed it was some kind of. . . occasion."

"Go on," She urged.

"Okay," I confessed in a rush. "So, I was hoping that you might have changed your mind. . . that you were going to change me, after all. "

A dozen emotions played across her face. Some I recognized: anger. . . pain. . . and then she seemed to collect herself and her expression became amused.

"You thought that would require formal dress code, did you?" she teased, touching the neckline of her black dress.

I scowled to hide my embarrassment. "I don't know how these things work. To me, at least, it seems more rational than prom does. " She was still grinning. "It's not funny," I said.

"No, you're right, it's not," she agreed, her smile fading. "I'd rather treat it like a joke, though, than believe you're serious. "

"But I am serious. "

She sighed deeply. "I know. And you're really that willing?"

The pain was back in her eyes. I bit my lip and nodded.

"So ready for this to be the end," she murmured, almost to herself, "for this to be the twilight of your life, though your life has barely started. You're ready to give up everything. "

"It's not the end, it's the beginning," I disagreed under my breath.

"I'm not worth it," she said sadly.

"Do you remember when you told me that I didn't see myself very clearly?" I asked, raising my eyebrows. "You obviously have the same blindness. "

"I know what I am. "

I sighed.

But her mercurial mood shifted on me. She pursed her lips, and her eyes were probing. She examined my face for a long moment.

"You're ready now, then?" she asked.

"Um. " I gulped. "Yes?"

She smiled, and moving on top of me and leaning down until her cold lips brushed against the skin just under the corner of my jaw.

"Right now?" she whispered, her breath blowing cool on my neck. I shivered involuntarily.

"Yes," I whispered, so my voice wouldn't have a chance to break. If she thought I was bluffing, she was going to be disappointed. I'd already made this decision, and I was sure. It didn't matter that my body was rigid as a plank, my hands balled into fists, my breathing erratic. . .

She chuckled darkly, and leaned away. Her face did look disappointed.

"You can't really believe that I would give in so easily," she said, her face and tone amused.

"A girl can dream. "

Her eyebrows rose. "Is that what you dream about? Being a monster?"

"Not exactly," I said, frowning at her word choice. Monster, indeed. "Mostly I dream about being with you forever. "

Her expression changed, softened and saddened by the subtle ache in my voice.

"Bella. " Her fingers lightly traced the shape of my lips. "I will stay with you – isn't that enough?"

I smiled under her fingertips, catching her palm in a kiss. "Enough for now. "

She frowned at my tenacity. No one was going to surrender tonight. She exhaled, and the sound was practically a growl.

I touched her face. "Look," I said. "I love you more than everything else in the world combined. Isn't that enough?"

"Yes, it is enough," she answered, smiling. "Enough for forever. "

And she leaned down to press her cold lips once more to my throat.

Someday I will walk hand in hand with her along the land of gods and monsters.


End file.
